Running (Working Title)
by musicfiend2392
Summary: Female!Sam is running from something or someone and Gabriel is drawn in by her. Its a bad summary, but I don't really know where this story is going yet, so until I can get a better handle on it, the summary isn't going to be awesome. Sorry.
1. Chapter 1

There was a very good reason for why she was running through the woods. There was a reason that she was only wearing a tank top and her favorite jeans; barefoot with her hair whipping around her face in the end of summer. There was a reason for why she had her hand cradling her arm to her body, hoping that her wrist wasn't broken - just minutely fractured. There was a reason for why her heart was beating out of her chest and her lungs were on fire and her legs had lost any feeling they ever had in them.

The reason was her boyfriend. Well, ex-boyfriend now. He didn't really take the breakup too well.

Why did they break up? It might have something to do with the sex that he was having with their neighbor, Jackie. Which lead to the screaming match, which then lead to him grabbing her arm and throwing her against the wall of the kitchen resulting in her landing pretty much on her wrist. Then he tried to beat her into submission. So she did the reasonable thing and defended herself; it wasn't her fault that she had a mean right hook for a girl her size. After he figured out what hit him, he grabbed a knife and she ran out the door for her life.

She was leaving behind a trail that she thought was a mile wide, but she couldn't stop. She had to keep moving. She felt like he was gaining on her with every step that she took and the fear of him catching her was the only thing that was keeping her moving. _Keep going. Keep moving. Get somewhere with people; get somewhere where you can hide. Road. ROAD. _

She was halfway through the right lane when she realized she was on asphalt. She didn't know what the name of the road was or which direction it was going, but it was a road and that was a miracle in and of itself. She ran back to the shoulder and then along it waiting for a car to come by. There was always a car that came by, right? That's how it happened in all the movies. It was just a matter of waiting.

But she was so tired of running...

Shadows. There were shadows in front of her, which was odd because the moon was non existent in the sky and the shadows were too pronounced for moonlight shadows. _Car lights, you idiot._ Of course, someone was behind her. She whipped around and threw her hands in the air, flailing them like a crazy person and yelled. She prayed, for the first time in a long time for the driver to stop.

The horn blared, but the truck in front of her stopped and she jogged to the driver's side. He didn't look like any of Luke's friends, so she figured he was safe. She looked at him with wide, scared eyes.

He was driving to clear his head. The truck he owned was old, about to rust through on the bottom, but he needed to spend his money on more important things at the moment, like paying his bills on his tiny apartment while he looked for a job. Obviously driving wasn't the best option because he would eventually need to replenish the gas, but he needed to get out of that place for a while. Just to feel the wind in his hair and to just lose himself in the roads.

He was doing a pretty good job of that until he heard the yelling that came from right in front of him and pulled him out of his reverie. He slammed on the brakes and was met with the sight of a young woman. She was ragged, her hair was a tangled mess and her eyes were wide with fear. It was then that he noticed that there wasn't any color in her face, save for the flush of her cheeks from the hard run she was on. She was dressed in a tank top and a pair of dark wash jeans that hugged her legs quite nicely. As she jogged over to the driver's side door, he noticed she was barefoot, now that was odd.

"Help me," was all that she could pant out.

Her body was hunched over and she looked as though she might vomit if she had to run again. Her arms were covered in little scratches that were now red, raised and angry looking, as though she had been running through the woods for an extended period of time. Her left arm was clutched to her body, and her hand hung at an odd angle. He was about to drive away, but she looked up at him with those big, scared eyes and he found himself saying, "Get in."

She looked taken aback, but ran around to the passenger's side door. He helped her open it, and she climbed into the cab awkwardly. Once she was situated, he told her, "We're going to a hospital to get that checked out."

"No," She said in a panicked shout and started hyperventilating. "No, no hospitals."

"Woah, alright, take it easy. No hospitals. I know a guy, he can look at you. Take a deep breath kid," he tried to calm her, but the results were marginal at best. He shifted the truck into gear and she crawled into the space between the footwell and the dash. It seemed to calm her down a bit, so he let her. After a bit of silence he asked her quietly, "So kiddo, do you have a name?"

She looked at him with distrust evident in her eyes, so he tried something different. "What are you running from?" Again, nothing but distrust. He tried one more time. "How old are you, kiddo?"

"...Twenty two," She said with a puzzled look on her face. Her voice was soft and a little ragged, but still rich and musical. He glanced down at her and smiled softly, then looked back at the road.

"Well, I'm thirty, which still makes you a kiddo to me. So that'll be your name until you give me another one."

They rode in silence for a long time before she spoke again. It was without prompting and that threw him enough to listen to the question. "What should I call you?" Her voice was softer now, and really he barely heard her over the roar of the engine in his decrepit truck.

"Call me Gabe," he said with a smirk, his eyes still on the road. They rode again in silence until he pulled up to the house they needed to visit in leu of a hospital and he put the truck in park, then shut off the ignition. He stopped for a second trying to figure out what he would say to the cranky old man inside, when she spoke.

"Call me Sam," she told him. She wasn't looking at him; she was staring at her knees, instead.

"Alright, Sam," Gabe said quietly. "Let's go wake up the crankiest man on the face of the Earth." He opened the door and climbed out of the cab of the truck and waited for the slam of her door before he shut his own. They walked together up the small, rickety staircase to the front door. Gabe took a deep breath and knocked.


	2. Chapter 2

Bobby was finally going to catch up on some much needed sleep when he woke up to the sound of someone knocking on his door. There was a moment where he debated getting up at all, but then he realized that it was roughly two in the morning, so anyone knocking on the door would only be doing it for a good reason. With that logic in mind, he crawled out of bed and stumbled to the front door.

When he finally wrenched it open and saw who was standing on his door, he almost shut it again. Gabriel was a friend in some of the loosest terms, but a friend was a friend and so instead of slamming the door, he asked, "What the hell are you doin' on my porch at two in the mornin', Gabriel?"

Gabriel smirked and quipped, "Are you always this charming, or just with me, Bobby?"

"Get in here, idjit, before I change my mind," Bobby said resigned. Bobby turned and walked in to the house and moved to the kitchen. Bobby could have sworn he heard something to the effect of 'come on, it's okay' coming from Gabriel, but that was nothing like the Gabriel that he knew. Shaking his head, he got into the kitchen and started making a pot of coffee.

"So why did you have to wake me up in the middle of the night, Gabe?" Bobby asked as he poured himself a cup of coffee and took a sip of the burning hot liquid.

"Well, that has something to do with her," Gabe said quietly. Bobby looked a bit perplexed, but when Gabriel moved aside to show the girl behind him he understood. She was only a touch shorter than Gabriel, with shoulder length brown hair. It was matted and there were sticks and leaves nestled in the tangles of hair, making her look almost like a princess of the woods. Her face was pale, and when she turned to look at him, he noticed her eyes were wide and dark green and scared. Terrified, even. Her nose was broken and her lips were full and pink; the bottom one was split, but even through all the injuries, even Bobby could see her beauty.

"What happened to her?" Bobby asked a bit loudly and the sudden change in volume made her flinch and cower behind Gabriel. Gabe sent a glare Bobby's way and the older man had the good sense to look sheepish. Gabe sat her down at the kitchen table and murmured something quietly to her and she seemed to stiffen for a moment. Gabriel turned then and found a coffee mug and poured a healthy dollop of coffee and a not so healthy dollop of whiskey into the cup and placed it in front of her. She didn't look up at him or Bobby, but took a swig of the irish coffee, which seemed to appease him enough to leave her in the kitchen while he took Bobby into the living room/library.

"I don't know," Gabriel said in almost a whisper. "I was driving along the road, trying to clear my head when I heard yelling. She was on the side of the road and begged for help. What was I supposed to do? Leave her there?"

"I never said that. But how do you know that she's not going to kill us? I mean, she hasn't said a thing the whole time that she's been here. She looks like hell, Gabe. Has she even said anything to you the whole time you've been with her?"

"Her name is Sam and she's twenty two. I have no idea what happened to her, but I know that her wrist is probably broken and that she's scared out of her mind. I just want you to look her over, make sure everything is okay and we'll be out of your hair. Or what's left of it..." Gabriel said the last bit with a smirk.

Bobby sighed, turned from Gabriel and trudged back into the kitchen. Sam was still sitting there at the table, with her hands clamped around the coffee mug. Bobby walked up to her and crouched down beside her. Sam stiffened but otherwise didn't move.

"What's your name, Sweetheart?" Bobby asked quietly. Sam flinched visibly and tried to back up closer to the wall. Gabriel held on to the back of the chair so she couldn't move. Sam whipped around stared at Gabriel with betrayed hurt in her eyes.

"It's okay, Sam, he won't hurt you," Gabriel said quietly. "Bobby has a lot of experience in field medicine." It didn't help, though; Sam looked about ready to run, even with the soothing words. She stared at Gabriel while Bobby moved closer and eventually touched her arm, trying to figure out where the problem was. Bobby ran his hand over her left arm and compared the two wrists deciding that yes, it was indeed broken.

"Gabriel, do you want me to check all of her? Because if you do, I need her to stand up and I don't think that she will if we just ask nicely."

Sam whipped her head to look at Bobby and then back to Gabriel. She started shaking her head violently, then kicking and thrashing to get out of Bobby's grip. It took both men by surprise and she slipped out of Bobby's grip and out the front door.

"Fuck!" Gabriel shouted and started to follow after her. Bobby grabbed his arm and held him back.

"Don't try. She's scared and not ready to be vulnerable with two men that she doesn't know. You did good getting her here. You did all you can," Bobby attempted at comfort, but Gabriel wasn't having any of that.

"You have to be joking. She's scared out of her mind, she's all alone and she's running from something that we don't even know what it is! You can't possibly expect me to just let her go back out there? What if the next person she runs into is the thing that she's running from? Hell, what if it's worse?!" Gabriel was yelling and walking out the door by the time that he finished his rant. He flew out the door and started yelling for Sam.

Sam was running, yet again. Not surprising, really; it seemed like no matter what she did, she ended up running from something. She could hear Gabriel calling for her near the house, but she didn't care. There was no way that she was going to let them near her. She had to get out of there. She didn't know Bobby; she didn't know if Bobby knew Luke or any of his friends. It wasn't safe, but she wanted to trust Gabriel...

She was running through the maze of cars that she found on Bobby's property, not really paying attention or caring which way she was going when she stumbled, cried out and fell over something. She landed on her shoulder, sparing her already injured wrist, but wrenching her arm in an interesting and not natural way. _And the hits just keep on coming_ she thought to herself.

She was trying to figure out the extent of the new damage to her body and why there was a freaking hubcap in the middle of the path, when Gabriel stumbled upon her. She tried to get up and run, but he ran in front of her and dropped down to meet her gaze.

"Are you alright?" he asked quietly in a voice that was full of concern. She was expecting yelling, demanding to know what the fuck she was thinking; when she heard the concern in the question it threw her.

"Yeah, just tripped," she answered in a wary tone.

"Come on, let's get you inside. It is cold out here, and it must be especially cold for you in a tank top."

She stayed seated on the ground, just looking at him. He leaned down and presented his hand, and for some reason she took it. He helped her up and held her hand as they walked back to the house. As they got closer, her heart rate picked up and her breathing rate increased. Gabriel stopped and just stood next to her waiting for her to again control again. When she didn't he talked to her in soothing tones, "Kiddo, relax, he's not going to hurt you. He's harmless. All he want's to do is make sure that you're okay, see if you need a cast." Sam calmed down a little and they walked hand and hand into the house. After all, she hadn't been hurt yet. Maybe she could trust Gabriel.

Bobby leaning in the sink in the kitchen with a coffee cup between his hands. Gabriel led Sam to the kitchen table and stood by her as she gathered her nerve. Sam wasn't sure why she trusted Gabriel, but she did and if he said that Bobby was harmless, then she would believe him until proven otherwise.

"You ready to let me look at you, Kid?" Bobby asked quietly as though Sam was a wild animal that was going to turn on him. It pissed her off; she wasn't fucking feral, she was scared. She steeled her nerve and nodded. Gabriel went to move to give Bobby some room, but she grabbed his wrist and kept him next to her. "Stay," was all she said, but Gabriel complied and stayed close to her.

Bobby was efficient and thorough. He looked over her torso and deemed that the worst of the damage was the broken wrist, followed closely by the now wrenched shoulder. When he wanted to look at her legs, she lost her resolve. She trembled like a leaf and looked at Gabriel.

"Please..." She asked quietly of him. He was good with the whole one word dialogue that they had going, and she hoped that he understood now.

"Sam, he's not going to hurt you," Gabriel said quietly, but she shook her head. There were certain things that she could not abide by, and letting this man who she met about an hour ago see her without pants on was one of them. "Okay, hold on," he told her and they left her alone in the kitchen again. She went and stood by the knife block. Just in case.

When they came back, Gabriel was in front of Bobby, walking slowly toward Sam. Gabriel stopped about five feet from her and Bobby was leaning on the door frame in the kitchen. She looked puzzled, and Gabriel started to speak.

"Alright, kiddo, listen. I know that you're not okay with Bobby, and that's fine. But we just want to make sure that you're okay other than the obvious damage. So far that went pretty well until we asked you to take your pants off. Now, we need to look at your legs and see that you're okay, so how can we make that happen?"

Sam looked at him for a long time mulling over her options. She couldn't run, they would just catch her, so she had to go through with this. However, the chances of Bobby seeing her without pants were nil.

"You," Sam said looking at Gabriel. His brow furrowed and then cleared.

"Sam, I don't know anything about wounds. I can't do this," He said tiredly.

She didn't budge. "You or nothing. I'll walk out right now," she said with a fierce determination that she didn't feel.

"I could tell you if there was anything wrong if you told me what it looked like," Bobby said quietly from the other side of the room. Gabriel looked incredulously at Bobby for a moment and then nodded.

"Alright. What do I do?"

"Look for anything out of the ordinary and if you find something describe it to me. I'll be around the corner to give you privacy, but close enough so that I can hear you."

Bobby left then, and Sam was alone with Gabriel. She wasn't afraid, though. Interesting.

Sam reached for the button on her jeans and popped it as Gabriel moved closer to her and kneeled down in front of her, not touching. Sam unzipped the zipper and slipped the pants down around her legs and stepped out of them.

Gabriel gasped and looked up at Sam. Her face was bright red with shame at the scars that covered her thighs. someone had taken a knife and carved 'WHORE' into the let thigh and 'PROPERTY' into the other. The scars were relatively new, and had healed pretty well, seeing as how they had little to no care.

"Can you turn for me?" Gabriel asked softly. He didn't really want to see the other side of her legs, but knew that he had to.

She choked off a sob but complied. This was humiliating. She should have told them that she was fine, but she doubted that they would have listened to her. The backs of her legs were fine, but on her left right calf, there was a fragment of a stick sticking out about a half inch. The area around the site was run and swollen and the stick looked like it was lined with white gunk. She cried silently as Gabriel finished his inspection of her. He tapped her calf softly and she slipped her jeans back on while he reported back to Bobby.

By the time they came back her eyes were clear and her cheeks were dry. Bobby spoke first.

"We need to talk about what happened to you."


	3. Chapter 3

"No," Sam said stubbornly to Bobby then promptly walked over to some free counter space and sat on it.

"Well, can I at least look at your leg? You have a huge splinter and I'd like to remove it before it gets infected."

Sam looked at Gabriel who nodded and smiled softly. Sam then rolled up the offending pant leg to show off the splinter that was lodged in her calf. Bobby gasped quietly then got to his feet and started searching for something. He grabbed the whiskey bottle, a bowl and some clean towels said to Gabriel, "Fill the bowl with warm water, as hot as you can stand, and put the towels in it. I'll be right back."

"What should I do with the whiskey?"

"You drink it, ya idjit. You'll both want the rest of the bottle by the time that this is done."

Gabriel watched the back of the older man disappear into the house before he came to his senses. He pulled the kitchen table from the wall and pulled it to the center of the room. He ushered Sam to the table and helped her up on to it; talking quietly to her and trying to explain what he could. He got her to lay down on her belly and rolled her pant leg up securely by the time that Bobby came back.

His arms were weighed down with bottles and syringes and gloves and other instruments that he would need to take care of Sam's leg. He had changed his clothes as well; switching out his sweatpants and t shirt to bloodstained scrub pants and a similarly bloodstained t shirt. The whole ensemble kind of made him look like a deranged surgeon, but Sam didn't say anything about it. She just looked straight ahead, her face pillowed on her good arm.

Bobby locally blocked the nerves in her calf and then started working on softening the skin around the splinter so that he could remove it. He didn't really talk much during the removal process, but Gabriel was picking up the slack by just keeping a running commentary of everything in his head that wasn't personal and that wasn't what was going on with Sam's leg. After Bobby finished applying bandages and gauze to the area, he took off his gloves and gave Sam two little pink pills.

"...Are these Benadryl?" She asked Bobby a little incredulously and Gabriel had to agree with her there. She just got out of a surgery, essentially, and Bobby was offering this?

"Just until I can get to the clinic so I can get some morphine. For now, take those," Bobby said as he pointed to the hot pink pills in her palm, "with this," Bobby continued by shoving the now half empty whiskey bottle to her. She gave him a dubious expression but complied.

By this point she was a little tipsy from the alcohol. Its not that she didn't know how to keep her liquor, because she did. The thing was that she was tired and scared and Luke had cut off her supply of alcohol about a year ago so she had to figure out where her line between tipsy and drunk was again. It also didn't help that all they had down with her since she got in was to pour the stuff down her throat. Not that she was complaining about that. What she was complaining about though was the fact that when she got drunk, she got talkative.

"Thanks. Oh, and by the way, thanks for getting that stick out of my leg." Bobby just nodded and said something gruff under his breath and Gabriel came to sit by her. "And thank you, too, for picking a crazy person like me up off the road," she told Gabriel.

"I don't think that you're crazy, kiddo. I think that you're scared and that you're running and that you've been running for a long time."

"How do you know that?" Sam asked with wonder in her voice. It was supposed to come out as confused, or maybe as vicious, but not wonder. She must be a little more tipsy than she thought.

"Because I've seen something like that in myself." Sam wanted to ask, to pry, but she couldn't make her mouth work. Instead, she just nodded and snuggled (as much as someone really can snuggle) into the table. She was just about to fall asleep when she heard Gabriel's voice filter through to her. "Come on, kiddo, lets get you to bed," and suddenly she was being lifted and cradled gently against a warm body.

She was moving through the house for only a short period of time before she was placed on a lumpy and slightly foul smelling cushion. The there was a pillow being pushed under her head and she realized belatedly that she was sleeping on a couch. A thick and slightly scratchy blanket was thrown over her and she burrowed deeper into the blanket trying to get more heat from it. Then she heard some some shuffling and felt a light...something, brush her temple. "Goodnight, Sam," was the last thing that she heard before sleep completely consumed her.

Gabriel straightened after tucking Sam in and went to go gather his belongings and get back to his apartment. He gathered his shoes, his coat and had finally found his keys after about an hour of searching the decrepit and pitch black house and was about to head out the door when he heard it.

There was a low moan that came from the living room where Sam was camped out on the couch. At first, Gabriel thought that he had imagined it, but when he turned, he heard it again and stopped to look at Sam as she slept. She was twitching, he realized; not in the good way that shows that someone is asleep peacefully. This was twitching that almost looked like she was trying to get away from something. Gabriel moved closer to the sleeping girl on the couch, and was just about to shake her awake when her eyes flew open and she jumped off the couch. She was panting and there was a slight sheen of sweat that covered her body.

Gabriel tried to reach out for her, but she pulled away with a wary look in her eyes. He pulled his hand back and showed her his palms in a placating gesture.

"Sorry, kid. Didn't mean to wake you."

"Didn't." Great. They were back to one word conversations.

"Oh. You want to talk about it?"

"No." She told him curtly as she tried to rebury herself in the blankets.

"Alright," he said as he got up and walked to the front door. His hand was on the knob turning it when he heard her.

"Stay," was all that she said, and that was really all that he needed to hear. He waited at the door for a moment before he decided the hell with it and turned and curled up on the floor next to the couch. Sam had deemed the spot that she was currently in good enough and she was now watching Gabriel get situated. She tossed him a pillow for his head and then a blanket so he would be warm. She closed her eyes, whispered "thanks" to Gabriel and let sleep overtake her again.

The next time that Sam woke up, she blinked her eyes open and tried to figure out where she was. Once she realized that she had no idea where she was, she sat bolt upright on the couch and immediately fell back down. Her shoulder was killing her, her wrist was swollen and in some serious pain and her calf felt like it was on fire. Not to mention there was a pounding in her head as though she was hungover.

Oh shit.

All the memories from the night before came crashing down on her. The fight with Luke, the running from Luke, getting picked up by some stranger-Gabriel- she corrected, meeting Bobby, showing the scars...

Before she had proper time to freak out, though, she heard some rustling from below her. Puzzled, she looked down to see Gabriel just waking up. He groaned as he got slowly to his feet, letting his joints crack and pop. When he was finally stable, he looked over at Sam and grunted something unintelligible and walked to the kitchen. Sam followed with her eyes as he made coffee and walked around the kitchen as though he was a regular guest.

When she finally managed to make her legs work again (and work was a relative term, seeing as how she needed to limp everywhere) she made her way slowly to the kitchen. She remembered where the mugs were from last night and grabbed one from the cabinet once the coffee was done brewing. She poured herself a cup and sat at the kitchen table across from Gabriel.

They sipped in silence for a while until Gabriel spoke quietly, "Bobby went to the clinic. He said he wouldn't be back for a few hours." Sam nodded in understanding and went back to sipping. Gabriel broke the silence again. "You feel like talking today?"

Sam mulled the question over. On the one hand, she didn't really feel like talking. On the other, she knew that she owed these men something after the way that they took her in and cared for her. After a minute of deliberation she nodded and said, "A bit."

Gabriel raised an eyebrow and took a celebratory sip of coffee while he decided which question to ask first. "How you feeling today?"

"Fine," Sam replied. It was a lie and they both knew it, but Gabriel just wanted to break the ice with an easy question.

"How did you get that stick in your leg? It was already infected, so it wasn't from your run in the woods last night."

"I 'fell down the stairs' and 'took out the bannister'," Sam replied dryly. Gabriel had a hunch that the person who told her to tell that shitty excuse for a cover story was the same person who she was running from.

"Who were you running from last night?"

"No," was the response that Sam gave and Gabriel understood what she meant by that.

"Why were you running last night?"

Sam thought for a moment, then deemed the question safe to answer. "Life or death situation."

Gabriel let that sink in and then asked, "Does that life or death situation have anything to do with those words carved into you?

"Sort of. He's not responsible for the writing, but he said he would help me and all he did was hurt me."

"Who was responsible for the writing?"

"My father."


	4. Chapter 4

What Gabriel really wanted to ask was _What the hell do you mean, your father was the one to mark you that way? What kind of father does that to his child?_ What he really said was, "Come again?"

"Did I stutter," Sam asked quietly, looking directly into Gabriel's eyes? "My father did this to me."

Bobby came in then, dressed in a pair of green scrubs that were decidedly less bloodstained than the ones from the night before, carrying what looked to be a good few pounds of medical equipment. When they heard the huffing and the puffing coming from the door, both Sam and Gabriel looked at Bobby, who grunted out, "Are ya idjits gonna sit there catchin' flies, or are ya gonna git off yer asses and help me?"

Gabriel got up, then, and took some of the supplies from Bobby's arms. While they were moving the items between themselves, Bobby whispered to Gabriel, "Is she talkin' more? Or is it still like pullin' teeth?"

"I asked her if she felt like talking, and she told me yes, so we've been having an interesting conversation. Though I don't know how much she's going to tell you if you decide to try to talk to her," Gabriel confessed as he snuck a glance over his shoulder.

"Ya know, I know that you guys are whispering over there. You might as well talk to me and not about me," came Sam's cheeky quip as she went in to take a sip of her now tepid coffee.

Bobby and Gabriel had the sense to look sheepish when they went to go put the medical supplies away. When they came back, Gabriel was carrying a small pill bottle and Bobby was carrying what looked like a white wrist brace. Sam got up and went to add some warm coffee to her cup, and when she got settled back in her chair and waited.

"So, do you feel like talkin' to me, or do you still not trust me," Bobby asked Sam once he was seated across the table from Sam.

"Seeing as how you didn't kill me in the night or return me to where I came from, I trust that you aren't a raving lunatic, nor are you one of Luke's friends. Therefore, I trust you enough to let you ask questions. However, if you are looking for complete and utter trust, you have another thing coming," Sam replied calmly.

"...Alright. So how does this work, we ask questions and you answer them? Just like that?"

"No. You can ask as many questions as you like, but I reserve the right to not answer them."

"Fair enough," Bobby replied. He thought for a moment and then asked his first question. "Who were you running from last night?"

"Pass."

"Why were you running last night?"

"It was a 'life or death situation', apparently," was Gabriel's reply. It was obvious that he was pissed off at the situation that they were all in, but he wasn't willing to let Sam be put in a situation that made her uncomfortable. Bobby nodded at him and turned back to Sam, looking to ask another question, but the Gabriel beat him to it. "When did you leave home?"

"When I was sixteen."

"Did you leave home because of your father?"

"Yes."

"Wait, hold on. What's with her father?"

Gabriel studied Sam's face as he told Bobby what Sam had told him. "Her father carved into her body." Bobby's mouth fell open and he seemed to freeze in shock, which gave Gabriel time to ask another question. "Can you tell us why he did that to you?"

Sam mulled over that question before starting in on her answer. "When I was very, very young my mother was killed. I have no memory of her. It broke my father; he was convinced that the police weren't doing enough to try to catch her killer. So, he took me and my brother and piled us both into his car with only a few possessions and took us all over the country, trying to hunt down whoever killed her. He convinced us that it was an elaborate scheme and that he was figuring it out. He drafted us into helping and brainwashed us. Of course, it was on accident; he was obsessed and didn't really realize I guess.

Eventually, when I got older, I started to realize that he was nuts and that there was really nothing to follow. All the 'leads' that he had were dead or were nonsensical. So I started to fight against the whole idea. My brother told me to just keep my head down and to help, but I couldn't condone that amount of insanity. My father and I fought about it all the time and I think he started to hate me.

Anyway, my father used credit card schemes to pay for our nomadic life. I wasn't too fond of it, but it worked for a long time until his aliases started to get flagged. Soon enough he was out of cards and out of money and needed to buy us some variety of meal. So he looked at me and told me to go put on my lowest cut top and my nicest jeans and meet him by the car. I did, then he drove me to a bar and told me to go in there and flirt with the men.

I didn't really get it at first; I was just fourteen, but I looked to be about seventeen with all my curves and charm. I walked into the bar and did as he instructed, hoping that whatever task he had for me was quick to finish, and he sat in the back in a booth and watched me. When one man came up to me and asked me how much, I finally understood..."

Bobby and Gabriel were staring unblinkingly at her. She didn't feel ashamed before that moment, but telling them that she whored herself out in order to get money to feed her brother suddenly felt dirty and wrong.

"Look," she said defensively, "I didn't do this because I thought that it would be fun or easy. I did this because I knew that my brother was giving up meals so that I could eat, and that wasn't right or fair."

"We know-" Gabriel started to say but Sam interrupted him.

"No, you don't know. You don't know what it's like to have a man you don't know between your legs and grunting and sweating over you; using your body like its fucking expendable. You don't know what it's like to be tied to a bed and whipped because it gets some sicko's rocks off, to escape from that kind of hell just to get back to someone who's supposed to love you unconditionally and then have them tell you that you're a failure and that you can't even be a whore; to have them tell you that all you had to do was open your legs and lay there, but you couldn't even do that. You don't know what it's like to have your father carve the words 'whore' and 'property' into you to remind you that that's all you are and that's all you'll ever be."

And with that, Sam got up from the table and walked to the door. "I'm done talking for today," was all she said as she slipped out into the yard.

After what seemed like an eternity of quiet, Bobby sighed. "Jesus Christ."

"Yeah," was all that Gabriel could say in response.

When Sam came back to the house a few hours later, there were three items on the table. The pill bottle, the brace looking thing and a note that was written in a loopy scrawl that Sam somehow knew was Gabriel's writing:

_Sam, _

_The brace is an air cast. In order to get a real cast, you would need to go to a hospital, and I know you don't want that, so this is the best we can do. It isn't a terrible fracture, Bobby says, so this thing should be more than adequate. The pills are morphine. Follow the dosing instructions on the label. _

_I'm sorry that we made you relive that. We didn't mean to make you so uncomfortable. Let us know how we can help you. Bobby is on the first floor, we made you a room on the second floor and I am staying, for the time being, on the third floor. Come get us when you want to talk again. _

_Gabriel and Bobby _

Sam slipped the brace on, took the correct dosage of morphine and went to investigate the library. 


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Sorry, this got a little wordy. I hope y'all don't mind. Sorry about the wait, too. I'm thinking that I'll try to update on Saturdays, just so you know. Anyways, on with the chapter. :)**

"What do you mean you can't find her?" Luke asked the man in front of him.

"I'm sorry, Luke, but we can't find her. It's like she disappeared off the face of the Earth. Everyone we show her picture to says that they haven't seen her and the men that I have canvasing the houses nearby haven't found anything either," the man said nervously.

"Well, it's not as though she disappeared. Someone has to be hiding her. There's no way that she could be doing this well on her own. I want her back. Soon."

"Yes, sir," the man said as he was backing towards the door.

"Don't make me have to make an example of you," Luke said calmly as he looked out the study window in his house across the backyard.

The other man shuddered at the memory of the last person that Luke had made an example of; the screams were heard for days all around the house before Allistair let the poor bastard die. The man ducked out of the room quickly and went to go redouble his efforts in finding the bitch.

Sam was in the library still, looking at all the rare information that was complied there when she heard the footsteps behind her. She turned and saw Bobby walking into the room and stop about half way in, debating whether or not this was a good idea. Sam waited for Bobby to speak, half dreading and half intrigued.

"Look, I know that you're probably in no mood to talk still, and that's fine; I have no intention of making you talk more. So just listen for a minute...I'm sorry that our questions led you to those memories, but you have to understand that we don't know anything about you. We needed something about where you came from in order to understand how you got here," Bobby finished. He seemed more uncomfortable than Sam did in that moment, which was interesting to her.

"You don't apologize very often, do you," she asked?

"Nah, can't say that I do."

"It shows," Sam said with a small smile. "It's okay, Bobby. I'm sorry that I couldn't handle sharing it. I thought that I was over it, and it turns out I'm not. It is what it is."

Bobby nodded then said, "You might want to go tell Gabriel that. He's up in his room beating the shit out of himself, metaphorically. Oh, by the way, what do you want from the diner down the road? I'm going out on a food run."

"Thanks for the tip, and some variety of salad," Sam told him as she went off in search of Gabriel. She climbed to the third floor of the house and hesitantly knocked on the door, but there was no answer. She put her ear to the door and didn't hear anything out of the ordinary, so she pushed the door open.

The room was small and the ceiling was slanted with the roof. The walls were once white, but were gray with dust and age. There were boxes all over the room and a small bed was shoved into the corner near a small window. The bed was unmade and there was a heap of dirty clothes near the foot of it. A chill sent Sam's eyes back over to the window and she noticed that it was open. She picked her way over to the window and looked outside it to find a perfect place to climb out to the roof.

She slithered through the open window and onto the shingles of the roof. Some were new, some were old, but all of them were slippery and she almost slid off the roof a few times before she managed to find him. He was sitting on the highest peak of the roof, of course, with a brooding expression on his face.

"You know, if you keep your face like that much longer, it'll freeze that way," Sam said teasingly. Gabriel sighed, but didn't say anything back to her. "You okay, Gabe?" she asked more seriously this time.

"I shouldn't have pressed you. I should have just left well enough alone. I just don't know when to shut up sometimes. Well, most times, I guess. I'm so sorry, Sam. I had no idea..."

"Gabe, relax, it's okay. I wasn't really forthcoming with the information. I thought that I was over it, but it turns out I'm not. That's okay, it is what it is; it's something I have to work through on my own. It's not your fault that I freaked out."

"But if I hadn't asked you all those questions, then you wouldn't have had to say anything about it..."

"It would have come out eventually, Gabe. It's a huge part, well actually, the main part of how I ended up with..." Sam replied, but her gaze turned thoughtful at the end of the statement.

Gabriel noticed the way that she trailed off at the end of the statement and watched her gaze as it went from thoughtful to something else. "Sam, don't go there. Don't think about it now. Sam. _Sam. _Sammy!" Gabriel was facing her and shaking her shoulder lightly as she broke out of her thoughts.

"Don't call me that," she said quietly.

"What, 'Sammy'?"

"Yeah. It's what Dean used to call me."

"Ah. Sorry," Gabriel replied.

They heard Bobby's truck pull into the drive way then and Sam led Gabriel back into the house. Once they both got into his bedroom, Sam stopped and looked at Gabriel, "You didn't do anything wrong. Don't beat yourself up about this. In fact, you're the reason that I feel safe enough to actually talk at all, let alone talk about what happened to me. You have done so much for me, and I really don't know why, and I really don't know how to repay you."

"I...thank you. If I'm going to be honest, I don't know why I did it either, but I'm glad I did. You don't have to repay me. Just get better and find someone that makes you happy and feel safe."

Sam just looked at him, almost as though studying him. The smell of greasy diner food was wafting up to Gabriel's room, and when they heard Bobby's muffled yelling Gabriel went to go figure out what was happening. It wasn't until Gabriel left the room that Sam let the words slip from her mouth in a barely there whisper, "I already have."

Dinner was a relatively quiet affair, there was some polite conversation, but overall, the mood was too tense to really get at the issues that needed to be talked about. It didn't really bother Sam that much because if she was being completely honest, she wanted to digest the fact that they knew about her past. She had only told one other person, and that was Luke. She knew that Gabe wasn't a bad person, and she wanted to think that Bobby wasn't bad either, but at this point she would rather be safe than sorry.

After all the dishes had been cleaned and put away and there was nothing else to do, Sam grabbed a beer and walked out onto the porch. She sat on the back stairs and thought about how she got here and what was going to happen with her, but mostly she thought about Luke and what he was doing right now. She had been left alone for a long time, considering that she ran away from him. Why was he waiting? What was he planning? What was he going to do once he found her?

She was so caught up in her own thoughts that she didn't even hear the door open and Gabriel step outside. He was standing behind her for a long time before he walked to her side and sat down on the stair next to her. "You know, I think that tomorrow we should go out and do something," he said out into the night.

Out of his peripheral vision, he saw Sam flinch slightly then compose herself before answering, "Yeah? And where would we go?"

"Well, I hear that the county fair is rolling in in a few days," Gabriel said still looking out past the cars in the yard. "Maybe we could get you some different clothes so that when we go you won't reek to high heaven," Gabriel looked at her then with a smirk on his face.

She turned and grinned at him. "You want to go to the county fair," she asked incredulously?

"Why not? I'm sure that it'll be entertaining enough. Anyway, I have to get out of here before my head explodes," Gabriel complained lightly.

Sam's grin faltered, then and she looked down at her feet. "He's done so much for me. He doesn't know me from Adam, but he took me in and nursed me back to health...I have no idea how to thank him," Sam said quietly.

"It's who he is. He's rough around the edges, but he's all soft and gooey on the inside," Gabriel said sarcastically trying to lighten the mood a bit. He saw the flicker of amusement cross her face before he added, "I'm serious, though. That's just the kind of person he is. I'm sure that if you asked him, he would tell you not to think anything of it and move on, so why waste everyone's time by asking him? Just know that you owe him one."

"Because that's not the way that I am," Sam answered. "I want to be able to pay my debt, and I think that Bobby is one of those people who would just let me continually owe him."

"Not if you let him know that the debt would bother you."

"Yeah...yeah, you're probably right."

"Of course I'm right. After all, I know him better than you do," Gabriel said matter-of-factly.

Sam looked at Gabriel then with an easy smile. "So, the county fair?"

"Yes, ma'am," Gabriel said through a thick southern accent as he mimed tipping a cowboy hat. The ridiculousness of the sight made Sam throw her head back and laugh, and Gabriel's breath stopped. He realized in that instant that she was beautiful when she was happy and laughing. He didn't have time to be uncomfortable about that, though, because Sam had started talking again.

"Alright, the county fair, then. And I agree, I do need something else to wear. Tomorrow will be the third day in the same clothes and that is so nasty," Sam said as she wrinkled her nose. She was still grinning, though, and the resulting face that she was making made Gabriel chuckle.

"Great, so we'll head to the store tomorrow to get you a new set of clothes, I can get my mail and Bobby can do...whatever it is that Bobby does when he's alone."

Sam grinned at Gabriel, "'Whatever it is that Bobby does when he's alone?' But no, I'd like that," She said through bouts of giggles.

"Good," Gabriel replied. "Well, I best get my beauty sleep. Night, Sam," Gabriel said as he rose to his feet.

"Goodnight, Gabe," Sam replied as she shook her head and returned to gazing out at the cars. He paused and looked at her before walking back into the house.

Bobby was in the living room, and when Gabriel walked past him to go upstairs, Bobby called out to him, "So when are you going to tell her?"

"Huh?" Gabriel said eloquently.

"When are you going to tell her that you want to date her," Bobby asked exasperatedly?

"I have no idea-"

"Don't try that with me, boy. I've seen you two for the past two days and I know that the last time that you were that comfortable with someone was when you were pretending to be someone that you weren't. So when are you gonna tell her," Bobby asked again?

"Bobby, she's been through hell. I really don't think that springing my feelings on her would be the best thing for me to do right now."

"Well obviously. But you should tell her at some point in the near future."

"Yeah, yeah," Gabriel called down to him as he climbed the stairs to his room. He resolutely didn't think about Sam at all the rest of the night. He didn't think about the way that she laughed, or how normal the smile looked on her face, or the way that her cheeks flushed the lightest pink when she was embarrassed. Nope, not at all.

He was so screwed.

By the time that Sam was forced out of bed by the morning sun, the smell of coffee was already wafting up the stairs to greet her nostrils. She walked in a daze down to the kitchen and found a steaming mug waiting for her. She eyed it cautiously before she decided to throw caution to the wind an taste it. The flavor ran over her taste buds and her eyes rolled back in her head, savoring it.

"The first sip is always the best," Gabriel said from where he was leaning up against the counter, watching Sam. She opened her eyes again and a sleepy smile crept on to her face as she nodded in agreement. He couldn't deny that she looked adorable in the morning; all sleep muddled and innocent. He could just imagine her walking around with that bed head one of his shirts and nothing else, drinking coffee and maybe eating some pancakes with fresh fruit and whipped cream-

_No, stop it._ Gabriel told himself.

"So, where are we going first," Sam asked?

Gabriel shook himself as though shaking off his thoughts. "My apartment," he answered. "I need to get my mail and see if my crazy landlord has evicted me yet." Sam gave him a puzzled look. _God she's adorable in the mornings_ Gabriel thought. "I'll explain on the way there," was what he actually said. "You ready to go?"

"Yeah, lead the way."

The trip was filled with stories of Gabriel's landlord. Apparently his name is Zachariah and he looks to be about a forty year old middle management type. He's constantly trying to throw Gabriel out of the building because he pranks all of his neighbors and has 'wild crazy parties', but technically he hasn't done anything that has broken the lease agreement until now.

"...So if he finds out that I just up and left for a few days without paying the rent that was due this month, then he can put all my shit out on the curb and go on about his merry way."

"That's really shitty, Gabriel. Is there anything that I can do?"

"Not unless you want to move in with me and get a job so that you can contribute to the rent," Gabriel replied half sarcastically and half seriously. He watched Sam's cheeks turn pink at the thought as she turned to look out the window.

Well. That was interesting.

He couldn't really explore that thought further, though, because they were turning into the drive for his apartment complex. When they got near his parking space, they saw all the belongings that were piled there and Gabriel sighed. "Well, looks like he figured it out."

"What are you going to do?"

"Well, get all my stuff into the bed and take it back to Bobby's. Then I guess I have to go apartment hunting," he said as he got out of the cab. He didn't really have that many belongings, so loading it was quick work. He slipped his key under Zachariah's door with a note telling him just where to shove his self righteousness and drove away.

Sam was quiet the whole time they were loading and unloading Gabriel's possessions. Bobby just sighed and told him that if her was staying longer than two months he was going to need some rent. Gabriel laughed him off, and got Sam back into the truck to go to the mall. As they were driving there, Gabriel asked, "What's up, Sam-I-am?"

It was a moment before Sam answered him. "I don't have any money."

"Relax, kiddo, it's on me," Gabriel replied easily.

"...should you really be spending your money when you have to go look for an apartment?"

"Kid, it's fine, I can handle my own bank account, I promise."

Sam blushed lightly at that and fell silent. When they pulled up to the mall parking lot, Sam was fidgeting and anxious. Gabriel parked the car further back than necessary, but didn't get out of the car. "Is this okay," he asked her quietly?

"There'll be a lot of people in there," she responded. It wasn't a question, just a statement.

"Do you want to go somewhere less crowded?" Sam looked over at him and paused before nodding. "Alright, kiddo, I know a place," Gabriel said and smiled warmly at her. She returned the soft smile and they drove for a while before pulling into a secondhand clothing store. "I know that the clothes won't be the best quality, but there will be significantly less people in here, and sometimes you can find brand new clothes for way cheaper."

Sam just smiled at him before saying, "I know. Before I left home I used to buy all my clothes second hand. It doesn't bother me." She was still smiling softly as she climbed out of the cab and walked to the front door. Gabriel followed a few steps behind her and watched her walk through the aisles, picking out flannel and jeans and tank tops. They seemed to make up her whole wardrobe. She didn't try anything on, just took them to the counter. Once everything was rung up, she took a set of clothing to the fitting rooms and changed out of her three day old garments.

"Feeling any better?"

"A bit, but I really need to make one more stop. You mind?"

"Not at all. Where are we going," Gabriel asked her once they were out of the store?

"I need new skivvies. The ones that I had were dirty and I knew that we were going shopping...so..." Sam trailed off at the end and her cheeks flushed candy apple red before it clicked in Gabriel's head.

"My, my, my, Sammykins. Are you going commando under there?" Gabriel teased. If it was possible, Sam turned even more red and stared resolutely out the window. Gabriel chuckled, but relented and drove back to the mall. She looked at him when they pulled into the parking space. "There is no need to skimp on skivvies, Sam-a-lam," Gabriel answered her questioning look, and before she could blink it seemed as though he was out of the cab and waking toward the mall. She debated sitting in the truck, but in the end she flung herself out of the cab and toward the doors. It was better if she was there, she reasoned. For damage control.

He was just about to call it a day when he saw them. The man was about five foot six, relaxed and carefree and the girl was probably five foot four, cautious and hesitant. That was what gave her away. For a twenty two year old, she watched things too closely; always looking for a way out. They moved together through the crowd and the man followed them at a distance. He could see them and hear the loud bouts of laughter come from the guy, but that was it until they stopped in front of the Victoria's Secret. He heard their conversation, then.

"No, Gabe, there's no way I'm going in there."

"Come on, Sam. They don't only sell sexy panties. They're good quality, so I hear, and if you're going to splurge on anything, it should be the clothing that touches your most intimate bits," the guy said with a lascivious wink and an eyebrow wiggle. The man nearly gagged at the comment, but instead pulled out his phone and dialed. He only had to wait two rings before he heard the other end pick up.

_"What?"_ Luke's voice crackled down the line.

"I found her," the man answered.

_"Can you take her now?"_

"Negative, she's in a shopping mall. Too many people. And she'e with someone."

_"Who?"_

"Unknown. I'll get a picture of his face and send it to you. Heard her call him 'Gabe'."

_"Tail them."_

"Understood."

The line went dead. He places the phone back into his pocket and waited for them to come out. _Gotcha_. Was his only thought.


	6. Chapter 6

Sam was mortified by the time that they stepped out of the ridiculous store. It would be one thing if it was just Gabriel shoving innuendo down her throat and waggling his eyebrows at every opportunity, but no, it was worse.

Sam walked in bashfully behind Gabriel, still half heartedly trying to get him to change his mind about the store while Gabriel strode into the store, practically with his chest puffed out like a rooster. He walked right up to one of the store associates, who looked over him hungrily before asking, "How can I help you?"

"I need some of your best merchandise for my girlfriend," Gabriel told her with a grin plastered to his face, threatening to split it in two. Sam turned about 50 different shades of red and gaped at the back of Gabriel's head.

She frowned slightly, then gained a predatory smirk of her own. "Of course, right this way. Oh, what size was she?"

Gabriel was quiet for a moment, then looked back at Sam. "Well, Sam, what's your size? We don't have all day," Gabriel said with a wink. The small act made Sam turn about another five shades of red before she mumbled out an answer.

"A s-small, I guess?" was the quiet reply.

The associate glared at Sam before turning back to Gabriel. "Oh, well, here are our best sellers, though, I don't know that these are the best idea for her. Maybe I can direct you to something that would be a little more...attainable?" she asked Sam, and this time it was Gabriel's turn to glare.

"Excuse me? We asked you for your best and you think that that's not what she wants? And what do you mean by attainable?" Gabriel was on rapid fire, getting louder with each question. The associate was getting more and more pale with each question and soon she was holding up her hands placatingly.

"Apologies, Sir. I was mistaken...I just thought that the lady might be a little more comfortable with some other merchandise."

"Don't apologize, just run along. You're no longer needed," Gabriel said with a glare that could freeze liquid nitrogen. She scuttled away with her proverbial tail between her legs and Gabriel turned around to look at Sam.

"Sorry about that. That was way more of a cluster-fuck than it needed to be."

"Why did you tell her that I was your girlfriend?"

"Why, does that idea repulse you so much?" Gabriel asked with a playful waggle of eyebrows.

Sam grappled with her extensive vocabulary for a moment before she realized that Gabriel was joking. Sam shot him a half hearted glare, but didn't answer him. Gabriel just snickered to himself and gathered up some of the articles of 'clothing' that were in front of him.

"Are you even going to ask me what I'd like to get?" Sam asked with no real venom behind the words. She wanted to pout a little bit, but somehow couldn't find it in her to be upset around Gabriel. He answered her while weighing the pros and cons regarding boy shorts and a g string.

"Would you tell me if I asked?"

"...Fair point."

Gabriel laughed quietly at that, deemed what he had in his hands as necessary and up to snuff and walked to the counter. On what looked to be impulse, he picked up a bottle of 'Tease' perfume from a display near the counter and threw that in with the rest of the items. The girl at the counter was thankfully not the same person who 'helped' them when they first came in. She and Gabriel made small talk while she rang up the items and he handed over a fancy looking black credit card. Sam looked at it interestedly, but the girl's hands were moving too quickly to gain any real information from the card.

Once outside the store, Sam begged to go back to Bobby's and Gabriel agreed. After all, there was only so much time left before he wanted to get going on their little adventure. Sam was quiet on the way back to Bobby's, but the vibe that she was giving off wasn't one of distress, so Gabriel left her alone to her thoughts.

It felt as though it was a significantly quicker ride from the mall to Bobby's, and when they did pull up into the drive, Gabriel didn't want to get out of the car. It was nice to sit with Sam and just be, which was odd for him because normally he liked to do things and talk to people. Sam had a pseudo calming affect on him, and Gabriel couldn't be persuaded to say that that bothered him.

Sam gathered her bags and practically ran up the stairs to throw them in her room. By the time that Gabriel made it to the second floor, Sam had disappeared into her room, only her voice floating out into the hallway. "When do you want to leave?"

Gabriel followed the sound of her voice to her room and leaned on the doorway appreciating the view that was in front of him. Sam was leaning over her bed, looking through the bags with her small but firm ass in the air, flowing smoothly into thighs that were lean and muscular, down into calves that were sculpted by the pagan gods. Her legs went to heaven, and he thought for a moment how they would feel wrapped around his hips as he-

"Gabe!" Sam said with a giggle that drew him out of his thoughts.

"Yeah?"

"Quit staring, it's rude," she laughed and the sound was beautiful. "What time do you want to go?"

"Well, that depends," Gabriel said, trying to wrangle in his mind to a more reasonable train of thought. "Do you want to get dinner before hand?"

"Do we have to?" Sam asked curiously.

"Nah, we could eat there I guess. It's your call," Gabriel told her.

"Well, why don't we eat there, then. That way we don't have to go all over town."

"Sounds good to me. How about we leave in an hour?"

"Okay," Sam smiled at him.

"Okay," Gabriel agreed. "See you in an hour."

An hour later, Gabriel was at the bottom of the stairs, leaning on the bannister shouting up to Sam. "Sam, come on! You really don't need to take this long to get ready!" Gabriel complained as he checked his watch. They were supposed to leave fifteen minutes ago, but Sam insisted that they wait until she figured out what she wanted to wear. It wasn't as though she had that many options, though, so Gabriel was starting to wonder what was taking her so long.

"Alright, alright, I'm coming," Sam said as she came running down the hallway. Her feet didn't seem to make any noise on the ancient floorboards as she flew down the stairs to meet him. She was freshly showered, wearing a dark green flannel shirt unbuttoned with a black tank top underneath. The jeans that she wore were a dark wash, but they hung around her hips a little loosely and when she lifted her arms to tie her hair back, Gabriel watched the inch of flat stomach that was exposed between her tan top riding up and her pants falling down a touch. Gabriel's mind shut down for the extent that the sliver of skin showed.

Sam was walking to the truck before all the neurons in Gabriel's head began firing again. He followed her out, resolutely not looking at the way that her hips swayed with her gait, and made it to the truck without incident.

The fairgrounds were about twenty minutes away, and Gabriel made it there in about fifteen. They parked the truck and walked up to the entrance, paid for tickets, had their hands stamped and they were in. Gabriel looked to Sam, and she had a look of wary fascination on her face. "Well, kiddo, where would you like to go first?" He watched Sam try to take everything in at once, her shoulders tense and her eyes wary. Completely on impulse, Gabriel grabbed her hand and her eyes flew down to their interlocked hands and then slowly up to him. Her face looked open and scared and Gabriel's thumb started to rub tentatively over her knuckles. He watched her shoulders slump a bit and a small smile turn the corners of her mouth up.

"I'm kind of hungry," Sam told him, locking her eyes on to him.

"That's my specialty," Gabe told her and started to coax her along the fairway to the rows upon rows of stalls selling food. There were tons of stands selling cotton candy, fudge, elephant ears, funnel cakes and pretty much fried everything, but the thing that caught Sam's eye was the french fry stand. There were tons of them, but the first one that they saw she stopped in front of.

"Would you mind if I got fries?" She asked him.

He smiled and answered, "Would you mind sharing them?"

Sam grinned, "Only if I got the bigger half," Sam told him.

"I'll see what I can do," Gabriel replied and walked up to the stand and ordered the fries. When he got back, Sam just looked at him expectantly. "What?" he asked her when she didn't say anything.

"Where's the vinegar?" She asked him and he gaped at her.

"Wait, you want to ruin something as wonderful as french fries with something as bitter and disgusting as _vinegar?_"

"it's not ruining, it's enhancing. Have you ever even tried it?"

"Once, and I didn't like it."

"Well, maybe you've changed your mind," she said as she walked up to the stand and shook a healthy amount of vinegar onto the fries. When she came back she was right in his space, her while body practically touching his; she drew a fry out of the bucket and held it up to his mouth. He opened and accepted the fry and flavor exploded over his tongue, coating his mouth. The vinegar wasn't so glaring this time, or maybe that was because it was Sam who was feeding it to him.

"It's not so bad," he confessed.

She shot a smug look at him. "I figured. You just need to broaden your horizons."

After they ate (she did get the bigger half) they went off in search of games and rides. Gabriel won a humongous and obnoxious blue tiger and won Sam a small orange bear. Sam finally dragged Gabe away from the games booths and over to the rides. There was only one that she wanted to go on and the night was almost over.

"This will be the last thing, I promise," Sam told him as he was dragged toward the ferris wheel.

"Whatever you want, Sam," Gabriel told her as they were loaded into the cart and whisked up into the air. The cart moved around the wheel twice before it was stopped at the top of the circle.

"Gabe...look at the view from up here," Sam said with awe. The panoramic view was beautiful, but that's not what Gabriel was looking at that. The stars that littered the sky surrounded Sam's face and bathed it in soft light.

"Breathtaking," was all that he could say, and when she looked at him, her smile was radiant. When she realized that he wasn't talking about the same view that she was, she blushed, and Gabriel had to try to remember how to breathe.

The cart started to move again and the spell was broken. They moved to the bottom of the wheel and they were off loaded in silence. It was a thick silence, maybe a little tense, but not terribly uncomfortable. It stayed that way until they made it to Bobby's and Gabriel shut off the engine. They both waited for a moment, then got out of the cab; the silence becoming too thick for the small space.

They walked up to Sam's room and she waited in front of her door with her hand on the handle for a moment before she turned around and faced Gabriel. "I had a really great time tonight," She told him. It was cliche, but Gabriel let it slide.

"So did I," Gabriel told her, and it was the truth. They waited there for a moment until Gabriel leaned in. It was just a fraction of an inch, but Sam hadn't moved away. In fact, it seemed she'd moved closer. Gabriel closed the gap between them and pressed a gentle kiss to her lips. It was sweet, nothing more than a meeting and a soft brush of lips, but it was enough to send fire down both of their spines. They both pulled away breathing a little harder.

"Goodnight, Gabe," Sam told him mirroring the smile. She turned, shook her head and entered her room.

"Goodnight, Sam," Gabriel told her with a small smile.

Gabriel walked to his room in a daze and landed in bed thinking only of how he could still feel Sam's lips on his.

Sam leaned against her door and pressed her fingers to her lips trying to ingrain the way Gabe's lips felt on hers. It wasn't until she heard a creak in the floor that she realized that she wasn't alone in the room.

"Hello, Sam," the voice spoke quietly into the room. Her heart froze and her blood ran cold.

"Luke," was all she could push out of her throat.


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: I'm sorry in advance, but this chapter is full of A LOT OF VIOLENCE AND GRAPHIC THEMES. If you didn't catch that the first time, go back and read the caps. This is a warning to people who have triggers, I"M SORRY. I will be more than happy to give you the summary of what happens in this chapter, if you message me.**

**Thanks, by the way, to everyone who has followed, favorited, commented, pretty much loved on me throughout the story. You all are great, and I just wanted to say thanks to you all. On with the show! **

Gabriel woke up the next morning with thoughts of breakfast and Sam. Now that she knew that Gabriel wanted her, he could turn up his charm and have her fall head over heels in love with him. And what better way to do that than through breakfast? With his mind made up, Gabriel went to go downstairs to start some pancakes.

When he got to the second floor he absently walked to Sam's door. When he realized where he was, all he could do was smile to himself. Sam had permeated every corner of his mind, it seemed. He leaned against the door, listening for her, but the room was too quiet to hear anything through the door. Gabriel opened the door just a crack, but the room was silent. Puzzled, Gabriel let the door swing open fully.

Sam wasn't there, which was harmless by itself. Her room was clean and organized; her bed made, her dirty clothes to one corner of the room and all the books that she was reading were all piled around her bed. It was so...Sam, that it made Gabriel smile in spite of the freak out that he was having.

What wasn't so harmless was that her bed wasn't rumpled because of a night of sleep and her dirty clothes weren't in the corner with all the others. Her room was spotless, except there wasn't a book on her bedside table or anywhere on her bed from a round of late night reading. Sam wasn't here, and from what Gabriel could tell, she hadn't been here for a while.

He turned then and tried to walk calmly to the kitchen, hoping that she was there. That she just got a early start to the day. That she was reading the paper, sitting at the table, or maybe on the counter with her feet dangling against the cabinets with a cup of coffee grasped between her hands. He ended up running, and when he got there, there was no Sam.

Gabriel froze when he didn't find Sam in the kitchen. "Sam?" Gabriel asked to the empty room. It was no use, Sam wasn't there. He walked to the living room, still calling out Sam's name. "Sam? Come on Sammy, don't be like this. You're starting to freak me out. Sam? Sammy! Sam! Please, Sam!" Gabriel was yelling by this point and woke Bobby up.

"The hell are you yellin' about this early, idjit?"

"I can't find Sam. I can't find her, Bobby, she's not here."

"Now Sam, you know that we have to talk," Luke was standing in the doorframe, lit from behind so Sam couldn't really see his face. It wasn't a good tone of voice; it was too calm and controlled. "Why did you think that you could leave me? Especially in the middle of the night? Who knows who could have picked you up?"

Luke was trying to sound as though he cared, but Sam knew better. He didn't care about her, he cared that one of his things was gone and now he had it back. It would be so much harder for her to get away this time. "As it happens, the person who picked me up was infinitely better than you," she mumbled to herself as she tried again to get some sort of slack in the ropes that were tying Sam's hands up above her head.

"What was that, sweetheart?" Luke asked her with so much sweetness that it almost made her gag.

"Nothing," she replied louder this time.

He was suddenly right next to her with his face hovering over hers. The rage that was in his eyes was evident from this distance, and the coldness there was frightening. She had no idea what he would do to her, but she was pretty sure that it would be worse than anything he had done before and that thought terrified her. "Don't test me, Sam, I'm not in the mood." Sam whimpered and nodded. "Good. Now, as for your punishment for leaving..."

Luke trailed off tapping his chin. Sam knew that he already knew what he was going to do. He never went into any situation without mapping out his moves. His expression brightened for a moment as though in realization and he pulled out a knife from behind his back and held it between them. Sam paled and visibly tried to shrink back into the ratty mattress that was underneath her. Luke smiled, "I think you need some reminding of what you are, Sam."

"Gabriel, ya need to calm down. Here," Bobby said as he passed Gabriel a drink, "Drink this down and tell me again what happened."

Gabriel accepted the whiskey and threw it back waiting until he could feel the warmth in his belly before he told Bobby, again, what happened last night and this morning.

"I dropped her off at her room last night and everything seemed fine. I went upstairs to sleep and didn't hear anything out of the ordinary. I woke up this morning and went to go check on Sam, and when I got to her room she was gone. Her room looks the same as it always does, no signs of a struggle or anything. It looks like she just up and left," Gabriel told him as he passed his glass back to Bobby and accepted another.

"Do you think she did?" Bobby asked.

"Why would she? She was happy here, right? She felt safe here. Why would she leave?"

"I dunno," Bobby answered looking lost. "Why don't we go look at her room and see if anything is gone. If she packed, we can assume that she left of her own accord. If not...well, we'll figure that out later."

They walked up the stairs and with Gabriel in the lead, in to Sam's room. The room smelled of Tease perfume and old books and Sam and the idea that she wasn't here was tearing Gabriel apart. He walked forward, though, looking at the books that she had strewn around her bed. Theologies, law, medicine, philosophy; Sam craved knowledge and she greedily took anything that she could get her hands on.

"What was Sam wearin' last night?" Bobby asked.

"Green flannel, black tank top and jeans. Why?" Gabriel asked and turned to face Bobby who was holding up Sam's flannel from the night before. "...So when Sam left, she was wearing a tank top and jeans." Gabriel said more to himself than anything else. He didn't get it, why would Sam leave the flannel? A look of realization came over his face and he whispered, "Shoes," into the room and started searching frantically for something.

"Come again?" Bobby asked him.

"Shoes. When I found her running along the side of the road, she was in a tank top and jeans and no shoes. Right now, wherever she is, she's wearing a tank top and jeans," Gabriel told him.

"...And no shoes," Bobby finished and immediately started looking for the pair of converse that Sam had loved. In the search, they had switched sides of the room that they were looking in. When Gabriel saw the shoelace that was peaking out from underneath a shopping bag his heart stopped.

"Bobby..." Gabriel whispered into the room.

Bobby turned then and saw Gabriel cradling a shoe.

The pain was close to unbearable.

It was worse than when Alastair was cutting her. At least he didn't know what to say in order to emotionally rip her apart along with the physical carving that was going on. Luke had already cut her clothes off and was infuriated when he found the neon pink g-string that she was wearing from last night. He automatically assumed that she was sleeping around to avoid him; trading sex for a place to hide from him, so he had re-carved the scars that covered her left thigh telling her 'I wouldn't have gone to someone else if you would have just remembered how to be the whore that you are' and 'Maybe you need a lesson on how to let me between your thighs'; promises of 'You'll have to learn again to take what I give you and like it' and 'Maybe it's been too long without someone reminding you of your place'.

After he finished carving the words into her, he had made her beg for his cock at knife point, and he gave it to her.

Twice.

The first time was harsh and rough and he was cold and unfeeling; it was for power, and Sam got the message loud and clear. It was okay, though; she had been through this before, and would get through it again. The second time he came to her, it was soft, kind and gentle. Sam thrashed as much as she could and tensed and begged him to stop, but he didn't. He just kept murmuring to her that she was a whore and that was all she would ever be. He left her when he was done, and she curled in on herself as much as she could and sobbed.

"We have no idea where to start looking, Bobby, that's the whole problem!" Gabriel yelled at the older man. They had been arguing for about an hour as to what the next step was other than, _find Sam._ Gabriel was frustrated, panicked and afraid for Sam. Those scars on her legs were new; there was no way that those scars are as old as her story. The psycho that she was with carved those words into her, he knew it. Now that she had run away, who knows what he would do to her.

"Well, we have to start somewhere. Just show me where you were drivin' and maybe we can figure out where she came from," Bobby told him patiently. Just because Bobby was being level headed didn't mean that he wasn't worried for Sam. In the short amount of time that she had been here, she had become like one of his own. Between that and the way that Sam was warming up to Gabriel (and the way Gabriel was falling in love with Sam), Bobby was just as frustrated as Gabriel and Gabriel shoutin' at him wasn't helping anything.

"...Okay. Though I don't know how much it'll do," Gabriel said defeated. He walked to the desk in the study and poured over the map. "I was on this main road, here," Gabriel told him pointing on the map.

"Well, that's a pretty long road. Why don't you tell me where you were going on your drive before that. Maybe we can narrow down which stretch you were on."

"It's not like I was really paying attention. I was driving to clear my head," Gabriel gritted out between clenched teeth. He was so mad at himself; why did he have to be so absentminded?

Bobby sighed. "What if you drive it?"

"Huh?"

"Drive, ya idjit. Get in your truck and we'll start at your old apartment and we'll retrace your path. That way I can get an idea of what stretch of road you were on."

"...That might work," Gabriel said quietly. "Come on, let's get crackin'," Gabriel told him with a glint of hope in his eyes.

Luke found her like that an hour later; sobbing and curled into as much of a ball as she could manage. He made a disgusted noise in the back of his throat and jerked Sam's legs away from her stomach and straightened them. He grabbed the end of some rope that was strewn about on the floor and tied her legs to the bed frame opposite her hands. Sam started to struggle, knowing what was coming next, but Luke slapped her, hard, across the face. Sam stilled as she tried to get the ringing in her ears to stop and her vision to not blur together.

"Sam, you know that you have to do what I tell you," Luke was saying. "If you don't, I'm going to have to make sure that you know that I own you. I control you. You are mine," he said punctuating each sentence with a cut from the knife that he was holding. It was the same knife from before; the same one that had carved into her a few hours ago.

Sam groaned with each bite of the blade into her skin. She tried to keep quiet, to not show any reaction, but it was too much. She whimpered when he stopped, "Please...don't. You own me, I'm yours...please..." Sam begged him.

"I want to believe you, Sam, I really do. But you've lied to me before. So, I think that I'm going to have to take a few more drastic measures than just having you repeat my words back to me," he said as he brought the point of the knife against her right thigh. "Try not to black out on me, sweetheart, or I'll find other words to write on you," Luke said with a sick grin, and then the pain started and Sam screamed.

"...So then I made a left here, I think, and I started-yeah, this is familiar," Gabe was telling Bobby who was riding shotgun armed with a map and a sharpie. He was highlighting Gabriel's route as the younger man drove through the back roads of Sioux Falls.

"Okay, and how long do you-" Bobby was saying when Gabriel interrupted him.

"This is it, Bobby! This is where I saw her! I drove past this sign and almost hit her!" Gabriel was yelling at Bobby with relief.

"Great. So I know what stretch of the road to look at. Let's get back to the house and see what's around here," Bobby said and Gabriel floored it back to Bobby's house. They were getting somewhere, and Gabriel couldn't be happier for that. The only thing that he could ask for at this point was that they could find Sam as soon as possible. Preferably now.

When they made it back to Bobby's, Gabriel flew out of the cab of the truck practically before he pulled the keys on of the ignition. By the time Bobby came walking in after him, Gabriel was bouncing in his seat by the desk in the living room. Bobby quickly made his way to the desk and laid the map out fully.

The lots that were surrounding the road were all wooded, but Gabriel was insistent that she came from the left side of the road. They looked at all the lots for 100 yards to see if there were any defining features. Each house seemed to be the same; about the same distance from the road, the same size, everything. Gabriel was getting frustrated again before he asked Bobby, "Are there any lots that have basements, or where the houses are further away from the others?" Bobby looked puzzled, and Gabriel explained his line of thinking. "The scars. They were newer than six years. I think that that freak she's with did that to her."

"They looked that new?"

"They didn't look six years old. She was traumatized, Bobby, why else would she be if he wasn't anything to be afraid of?"

"He did try to kill her," Bobby countered.

"Yeah," Gabriel countered, "And what makes you think that he wouldn't cut her up along with attempt to kill her and whore her out to whoever pays the most?"

"...Fair point," Bobby conceded and started to look up the specifics on the houses that were in the 100 yards of land that they were looking at. It was a long search, but it ended with decent results. "Okay," Bobby said about an hour and a half later, "There are two houses that could be what we're looking for." Bobby wrote down the addresses and handed them to Gabriel.

"Alright," Gabriel said with a grim face, "Let's do some recon."

Sam had been awake the whole time that Luke was carving into her thigh. Both of them were bloodied and bruised; there were nicks where Sam had started thrashing and the knife slipped and rope burns around her wrists and ankles. When Luke had finished with his "masterpiece" he had thrown a dirty towel at her, untied her arms and told her to clean herself up; that "next time he wanted to fuck what was his, he didn't want to get bloody in the process".

When he left, he had bolted the door behind him leaving Sam alone in the room. It was dark; there were no windows, only one door out. The room was square and the walls were thick, maybe even soundproof. Everything was dirty; the floors, the ceiling, the mattress, hell, even the rag he had thrown at her had been dirty. It was interesting that he would have a room like this, seeing as how Luke was methodical and almost OCD in his cleanliness. _Probably for the ambiance_ Sam thought dryly.

She untied her feet with shaky hands and retrieved the towel from the floor where it had fallen. Her legs burned when she brought them up to her stomach to inspect the damage. The skin around the gashes was red and hot to the touch. She was afraid that they might be infected already, but she realized that an infection wouldn't set in for a day or so. The lines were sure, as though he knew when she would thrash and try to throw him off of her. It was infuriating, but Sam pushed that down and tried to find the cleanest part of the rag.

As she cleaned, she thought about Gabriel. What was he doing? When did he find out that she was gone? Was he looking for her? Did he get her secret message with her shoes and her lack of over shirt? Did he even care that she was gone? Did he care at all for her? She knew that he liked her, maybe even wanted to sleep with her, but did he love her that way that she loved him?

Wait. What?

When did she come to the conclusion that she loved him? It was apparent to her; there was no denying that he made her feel safe and cherished and happy and carefree like she did back before all of this badness in her life, but since when did she want, no, need that to be reciprocated?

Okay, so maybe she knew for a while that she had loved him (read: since that day that she had gotten him off the roof), but it shouldn't mean anything. She had never had love before, so why did she need it now? But no matter how she tried to tell herself that it was nothing, she still wanted more than anything to have that feeling returned.

_Not that it matters._ she thought to herself. _It's not like I'll ever see him again._

Gabriel was fidgeting again. Bobby had told him three times at the previous house to calm the hell down; that no amount of twitching was going to make them find her faster, but Gabriel couldn't really stop himself. So, Bobby told him to either get it under control or he was going to watch a different house. Gabriel had stopped, thankfully, but a few hours later, he was back to fidgeting, so Bobby packed up and walked to the next house.

This one had more promise; there were people that were patrolling the inside of the house, whereas the other place looked to be the home of a younger couple that was blissfully in love. Upon further inspection with the aid of binoculars, it was ascertained that the female of the couple looked nothing like Sam. The men that they saw were stoic and dressed in an everyday fashion, but they had ear wigs or they carried around walkie talkies which really gave them away.

They took the house in shifts, sleeping- for a few hours in Bobby's case, or an hour or two in Gabriel's -before switching off with the other. Bobby was better rested, but Gabriel was the one to determine that there was an anomaly in the watch of the third man patrolling the grounds. He would come just two minutes later than everyone else, which would give him enough time to get in there and find Sam.

When Gabriel told Bobby this, the older man snorted with disdain. "Are you kidding, Gabe? We have no idea what the interior of the house looks like, how many people are actually in there, if Luke is in there, where Sam is; hell, we don't really know ANYTHING."

Gabriel was quiet for the whole rant that Bobby gave, then looked the older man in the eye and told him quite calmly, "You're right. But I do know that I can't leave her in there any longer than I have to. I'm going in there, tonight, Bobby. I'm going to get her out, and I really don't care what I have to do to accomplish that."

Bobby looked at Gabriel and shook his head. "I have your back, ya idjit," was all that Bobby told him in reply, and Gabriel slipped out of the truck and into the night.


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: Hey guys, you get an early update this week because I have a two exams coming up and it's my roommate's birthday this weekend, so I'm going to be taking care of her drunken ass on Saturday. The next chapter won't be posted until February 9th. Sorry about the long wait. **

**Speaking of the next chapter, I have a question to ask of you. I can go one of two ways with this story. I could write the next chapter so that it ends with Gabriel explaining everything to Bobby and then have an epilogue, or I can write it with Gabriel telling Bobby everything and then explore a relationship with sam and Gabriel and *then* finish it off with an epilogue. Let me know.**

**As for this chapter, there's some violence. Be warned. Thanks everyone! :)**

Gabriel was silent as he made his way over the lawn and closer to the house. It seemed as though he was gliding over the grass and up to the door. The handle gave easily and opened smoothly, allowing him to slip in unnoticed.

It was at that point that he realized what a fatal error he made by not figuring out the rest of the layout of the house before he came in. He had no idea who was where, how they were patrolling, how to get into the basement, where Luke was, if Sam was even down in the basement to begin with, nothing. Cursing his impulsiveness, he started to scour the first floor and see what turned up.

He walked further into what appeared to be a living room and scanned for anything that could help him with his recon or making sure that he stayed alive long enough to get to Sam and to get her the hell out of there. There weren't any real weapons in the room, though he did get a decent view of what Luke looked like due to all the pictures of him and Sam scattered all over. They seemed to be happy and loving in every single one of them, and Gabriel had to wonder at what point the relationship soured.

There were two doors that were available to him at this point, one on the opposite wall, the other on the adjacent wall, however on the far end of the wall. Walking to that door, he saw a long hallway with no one in it. Betting that that was his better option, he walked down the hallway and came to a doorway on his right. He glanced in and saw a formal dining room. There were two doors in this room; one, he assumed, led back to the living room and the other he had no idea what to expect. Quickly making sure that there was no one in the room, he snuck past the doorway further down the hall.

About twenty feet ahead of him there was another doorway on his right. Performing the same cursory sweep of the inside of the room made his stomach turn to ice. Inside was a kitchen, but more importantly, three men were in black suits and armed to the teeth with really big guns. Okay, so they might not have been huge or anything, but seeing as how Gabriel didn't have _anything_ to protect himself with, they looked pretty freaking huge.

The men were talking amongst themselves quietly, not even noticing that he was there. Gabriel leaned against the wall in the hallway and desperately attempted to make his heart slow down and make his brain think of what he should do. He knew basic skills on how to knock someone unconscious, but there was a difference in theoretical knowledge and previous experience, so he wanted to try to not use that unless he had to. Other than that, he had no idea how long the goons would stand there in the kitchen, and he had no idea if he could sneak past them.

He was about to try to work up the courage to go in there, when he heard the voices in the kitchen move away from him and back the way he came. Relief flooded through him, and he peeked his head into the doorway swiftly to make sure that everyone was gone. Once he made sure he was alone, he creeped into the room and looked for a weapon. Something small enough to carry with him that wouldn't be seen, but lethal. So naturally he started looking for the knife block or drawer. He found a wicked looking blade in the block that was small enough to hide on his person but looked like it could do a pretty decent job at distracting someone for a moment or two if it was lodged in their side and decided to keep moving.

He moved back out into the hallway and down toward the end to the final doorway. This one had a door in it, and he put his ear to the wood to see if he could hear anything. When he realized that the effort was futile, he gathered his nerve, and slowly turned the knob. It gave easily under his palm, and he swung the door in to reveal a study. There was a bookshelf lining the inside wall, and there was a desk that was close to the outside wall. The walls were pretty much barren, he noticed as he stepped inside, and the desk was covered in important looking documents, but they were all in neat piles. Intrigued, Gabriel moved toward the desk and looked at the name on the papers. "Luke" was at the top of the memos and the more personal pages, and "Lucifer" or "Mr. Novak" were on the others. _Lived up to his name, _Gabriel thought as he moved further into the room.

There was a door on the far wall. It looked different from the rest of the doors; there were locks on this one, and it looked as though it gone through some abuse. Curiously, he stepped closer to it, wondering if it went down to the basement. As he moved closer, he could hear voices floating under the door between the bottom of the door and the floor. One was male, the voice smooth, with a hint of gravel in it, the other was mostly too quiet to hear, Gabriel could only pick up a british accent.

After a moment, he heard footsteps on the stairs and Gabriel moved to hide behind the door leading o the hallway. It wasn't the best of places, but it was either that, under the desk (which could be disastrous, especially if "Lucifer" wanted to get some work done) or out in the open, which would most certainly get him killed. Gabriel heard the door open and some mumbling with a british accent pass him and move through the doorway. Breathing quiet sigh of relief, Gabriel extricated himself from his hiding place and made his way to the other door.

After pausing and listening for other voices, Gabriel carefully crept through the door and down the stairs. He carefully tested his weight on each step before trusting all of his weight to it; not wanting to hit an unexpected squeak and have his cover be blown. It seemed like ages, but he finally made it down the stairs, and once he finally reached the bottom, he took in his surroundings.

The basement was dark, but Gabriel could make out some shapes of boxes and other obstacles. Other than that, the floor seemed relatively clear and clean, along with the rest of the space. There were no cobwebs or other creepy crawlies in the basement. He carefully maneuvered his way further into the space until he saw the outline of another room. This one had a door that was left slightly ajar and there was a light on inside. Gabriel slid next to the doorframe and peaked inside, which caused his heart to jump.

Sam was in there. Sam, _his Sam,_ was in there. She was huddled in the corner of a dirty bed on the far, dirty wall. The floor was thick with dust and grime and the ceiling looked as though it was about to cave in. Sam was scared; her legs curled tightly up to her, her knees right under her chin with her arms thrown around them for good measure. She was naked, or what appeared to be naked, and she kept watchful eyes on the other person in the room. The more Gabriel noticed about the distressed state Sam was in, the more his blood boiled.

He should have gotten here sooner. He shouldn't have wasted time with anything, just infiltrating and getting Sam out. Before he knew what he was doing, he pushed the door open, brandishing the knife with one hand and, with more calm than he really felt, he spoke with a voice that was smooth and full of authority.

"Get away from her."

Sam's head whipped up to look at him, and there was so much hope and fear in her eyes that it made his whole body ache. Lucifer turned at the words and smiled at him.

"Ah, Gabriel, is it?"

"...How do you know me?"

"Sammy here talks about you a lot," he answered cooly.

"Don't call her that."

"Don't call me that," Sam and Gabriel said together. Under different circumstances, Gabriel would have stopped to smile a little at that, but right now, all of his attention was focused on Lucifer.

"She's mine, I can call her what I please. In fact, I can do whatever I want with her," Lucifer told him easily as a leer spread across his face.

Gabriel swallowed back the bile that rose to the back of his throat before saying, "Sam doesn't belong to _anyone_. She's her own person. And if you touched her, I swear you'll pay."

"That's not what she told me. And I did touch her. Repeatedly," Lucifer grinned at him, and the smile was tainted with knowing that he forced her to say it; as though he was reliving it for a moment before he turned to Sam and asked her, "Isn't that right, Sweetheart?"

Sam cringed at the nickname, then straightened her spine and told him, "I don't belong to anyone."

"Hm...I remember that conversation a bit differently. Maybe I should remind you," he said as he advanced on her. She curled in on herself reflexively and whimpered, and Gabriel snapped.

"Leave her the fuck alone," he told Lucifer. The other man stopped then, as though remembering that there was someone else in the room.

"And what are you going to do to stop me?"

Gabriel didn't say anything, just readjusted his grip on the knife that he was holding and waited. Lucifer smirked at him. "Do you have any idea how to use that?" He asked as he produced his own knife.

"I know enough," Gabriel told him as they advanced on each other. They left about five feet between each other and started to circle one another, studying the way that the other was moving, looking for a gap in the defensive measures. It seemed like they danced around for ages until Lucifer stepped forward and slashed at Gabriel. Gabriel dodged and slashed at the other man, nicking his arm.

Lucifer retreated a step or two and began his defensive circling again. Gabriel mimicked him and this time it was Gabriel who stepped forward to take a shot at Lucifer. Lucifer ducked out of the way and slashed at Gabriel and left a long gash down the shorter man's back. Gabriel yelped in pain and retreated quickly. Lucifer followed him, attempting to attack again and Gabriel dodged most of the slashes. Lucifer nicked him a few times here and there, but the pain was nothing compared to the gash on his back.

Gabriel was beginning to be overcome with the pain and Lucifer was getting cocky. They had been only fighting for a short time, but to Gabriel it seemed like hours. Lucifer didn't seem to ever stop, just kept moving. He was always a step ahead of Gabriel and the mix of pain and irritation wasn't doing him any favors. Lucifer went in to strike and Gabriel dodged for the thousandth time when Lucifer kicked Gabriel's legs out from under him. He landed with an inelegant 'oof' and Lucifer followed him down, pinning his arms where they fell.

"Any last words?" Lucifer asked the man below him. Nothing came from Gabriel's lips, and Lucifer looked back to Sam to say, "This pathetic creature; this broken and ugly thing is what you left me for?"

Sam was about to defend Gabriel when there was a whirl of movement and suddenly Gabriel was on top of a pinned Lucifer. "Yeah, Luke, I have a few things to say. You are a great big bag of dicks, and stay the fuck away from Sam," Gabriel told a spluttering Lucifer before shoving the knife as deep as it would go between two ribs. Lucifer looked shocked at the whole series of events, then angry as he tried to claw at Gabriel. Gabriel began stabbing Lucifer over and over again getting his hands and arms covered in blood in the process.

Once Lucifer stopped moving, Gabriel looked over at Sam. She was still in the far corner of the bed, still huddled in on herself. She was definitely naked, and that posed a serious problem. She couldn't go running around naked. Gabriel got up slowly and moved toward her and taking off his outer flannel shirt while speaking in a hushed, calming tone. "Sam, can you look at me?" he asked as he walked toward her.

Sam's eyes were torn from the limp body on the floor and snapped up to Gabriel. Her face was pale and she licked her lips before trying to find her voice.

"I-is...Is he r-really...dead?" she asked him hesitantly.

"Yeah, Sam, he's really dead," he told her as her eyes drifted toward the body again. "Sam," Gabriel spoke her name sharply and her eyes snapped to him. He had the shirt completely off now and was handing it to Sam. "I need you to tell me if you can get up. We need to get out of here as fast as possible. Someone is going to notice that he's dead and I really don't want to be here for that."

Sam nodded and then stood on shaky legs, taking the shirt from Gabriel and slipping it on. She did the buttons up with relative ease of practiced fingers. Gabriel wanted to hold his hand out to steady her, but he was covered in blood and he really didn't want to traumatize her more. Sam steadied herself and started to walk toward the door of the room, stubbornly not looking at the body that was on the floor. Gabriel was proud, he realized as she lead him to a door that he hadn't noticed on his way to the room where Sam was being kept. He was proud of Sam and the way that she could just focus on the task at hand and not what was going on around her. She was resilient, and they could get through this. They _would _get through this.

Sam tried the handle of the door and found it to be locked. She looked to Gabriel, and he motioned for her to step aside. When she did, he took a moment to center himself before he inhaled sharply and kicked the door with as much strength as he could muster. The door flew open with the force of the kick and suddenly they heard footsteps above them, moving toward the door to the basement. He ushered her out and grabbed her hand as they ran back the way her had originally come from. Bobby's truck wasn't there, and Gabriel cursed in his head.

They ran hand in hand away from the house and along the road. Gabriel was leading, trying desperately to remember how to get back to Bobby's when Sam started to slow. She was panting and looked like she was going to throw up. "Not now, Sam, please," He yelled back to her. "Just a little longer."

Sam just nodded and renewed her pace as they ran along the backroads of Sioux Falls. It wasn't very long before Gabriel came up to the looming shadow that was his truck. Bobby was leaned against the driver's side door, his feet stretched out to the passenger's seat. Gabriel patted the bed of the truck as he ran around to the passenger's side with Sam. Bobby jerked and let them in before saying, "Christ, boy, I thought I was gonna have to go in there after ya."

"Just get us out of here, Bobby," Gabriel told him as Sam climbed into the footwell of the passenger's seat.

"Is that blood? Why doesn't Sam have clothes on? What did you do, Gabriel?" Bobby yelled at him. Sam flinched, even curled up as she was and Gabriel threw the older man a death glare.

Gabriel drew his legs up and sat indian style on the seat as he told Bobby quietly, "Yes, it's blood. I did what I had to, and I will explain everything later. Right now, we need to get the fuck out of here."

Bobby complied with a bit of grumbling under his breath, and soon enough they were racing back to the older man's house. The ride was quiet; Gabriel was murmuring to Sam, just a flow of words to soothe her. Once they arrived, Bobby got out and walked to the door and slipping inside. Gabriel opened the door and motioned for Sam to get out first, but she shook her head. Gabriel extricated himself from the car and once safely on the ground motioned for Sam to get out. Sam looked hesitantly at him, and he gave her a small smile as he beckoned her again. She glanced around them and, rather gracefully, maneuvered out of the cab of the truck. Gabriel shut the door as quietly as he could, but Sam still jumped at the noise and ran into the house after Bobby. Gabriel sighed and walked up to the house. _This is going to be a long night_ he thought to himself.


	9. Chapter 9

It was about an hour later, after Gabriel had scrubbed the blood from his hands and arms, burned most of the clothes that he was wearing out back and poured himself a glass of whiskey when he came to the conclusion that Sam wasn't Sam. Well, Sam wasn't the same Sam that Gabriel fell madly in love with, at least. He knew that she was in there; that strong, stubborn girl who thirsted for knowledge, who hated mornings and savored the first sip of coffee more than all the others. He knew she was there. She had to be. But it was so hard for him to see that when he looked at the girl sitting in front of him.

Sam had her knees under her chin and her arms wrapped protectively around herself, looking so scared that she might bolt into the night that held more unknown terrors than the ones she faced here. She was trembling slightly and her eyes were racing around the room, checking and rechecking all the places for someone to hide.

It broke Gabriel's heart to see her like that, and he wished with every fiber of his being that he could torture Lucifer so he could see what he inflicted on Sam. That wasn't love. That was hate, and rage and-

"Gabe," came a voice quietly to his right. Gabriel watched Sam flinch at the noise before he responded to Bobby.

"Yeah?" He asked as quietly as he could, his eyes never leaving Sam.

"We need to check her over. She could need medical help. I know that you don't want to freak her out anymore than she already is, but she doesn't trust me, and you can at least get close to her."

Gabriel looked defeated at the thought. "It can't wait?"

Bobby knew that it could, but he didn't want to risk it. There were too many things that could go wrong if something were left unchecked. "No," he told the shorter man.

Gabriel sighed quietly. "...Alright," he told Bobby and pushed away from the kitchen doorframe. He walked slowly toward Sam and called her name quietly. She flinched and her eyes whipped over to him. He watched as her eyes widened and her breathing visibly picked up. He stopped then and held up his hands placatingly. "Sam, I need to talk to you. Will you talk to me?"

Sam looked at him for a long moment, but didn't say anything. Gabriel waited in silence for what felt like a century before she nodded her head slightly and immediately scanned the room for an unseen enemy.

"Sam," Gabriel called out getting Sam's attention back, "I know that you don't want to hear this, but I have to tell you...We need to make sure that you're okay...That nothing is infected or otherwise life threatening," At this, Sam's eyes widened again and she shrank back into the couch cushions, bringing her arms more firmly around her legs. It broke Gabriel's heart, but he kept talking. "We need to see what needs daily care in order to heal," and with that, Sam started to shake her head emphatically. Gabriel bit the inside of his cheek so he didn't break down and cry at the sight of what Sam had become. Gabriel took a deep breath and begged, "Please, Sam..." he asked, and his voice broke with all the held back emotion.

A tear spilled down Sam's cheek as she continued to look at Gabriel with pleading in her eyes. He bit into his cheek so hard that he tasted blood, but it held back the tears that were threatening to fall. He would not cry in front of her. She needed to have someone who could help her carry her burden and not break with the strain. She needed someone who could be there and listen to every terrible detail if she needed to tell someone and Gabriel was determined to be the one that she could go to.

Sam cried for a few minutes silently before she broke eye contact and nodded shakily. She only murmured one word, and it would have been lost if anyone took a breath in that moment. "You."

Gabriel was torn between a sigh of relief and wanting to run. Instead, he nodded at her and then glanced at Bobby who turned the corner so that he was fully in the kitchen. He rustled around in there for a moment before Gabriel heard the clinking of glass on wood as Bobby placed a bottle of whiskey on the ground and returned to the kitchen.

"Whenever you're ready," was all that Bobby said.

Gabriel looked at Sam and jerked his head in the direction of the bottle. "You want a drink?" he asked her quietly, but she just scanned the room. Gabriel narrated his motions as he walked over to the bottle and picked it up and brought it back so that it was within reach of both of them. He didn't know why he thought he needed to narrate, but it made him feel better, and he suspected it made Sam feel a little better too, so he did it.

"Can you stand for me, Sam?" he asked her quietly once he was in front of her. He was crouching so that they were at about the same level. Sam looked at him with fear and something else in her eyes, but she slowly unfolded her body and placed her feet on the ground. Sam rose slowly on uncertain legs, and Gabriel was there, rising with her, keeping a hand out in case she needed to steady herself.

Once she was on her feet, she took a deep breath and rolled her shoulders back as though preparing for a fight. It would have been amusing, Sam in a shirt that was slightly too big for her looking resolved to punch someone in the face if they made a wrong move, but in this case it was...wrong. She seemed like a kid who was squaring off with the monster in her closet; fear evident in every inch of her, but she was trying to stay strong and bury that fear. It was...not Sam.

Gabriel mentally shook himself before walking up to Sam slowly. "Can you take the shirt off, Sam?" He nearly lost his nerve, called the whole thing off when Sam's face blanched, but he didn't. The inside of his mouth would never be the same from all the biting he was doing to the insides of his cheeks and now his tongue, but he kept his mouth shut as she nodded; glued his hands to his sides as she struggled with the buttons of the flannel that she wore. Once she got all the buttons unclasped, she took a deep breath and rolled the shirt off of her shoulders and let it pool on the floor.

Gabriel did his best not to gasp.

He didn't quite manage it.

There were marks all over her body. It was too much to take in at once. He wanted to shut his eyes, to turn his head away, to run away from this pain and suffering, but he stayed. He looked at her eyes then and saw that they were wet and staring at the wall behind him. It was then that he noticed that there were tears running down her face.

"You okay?" He asked her even though he knew the answer. She waited a few moments too long before nodding her head slightly. He nodded in reply and then told her, "I don't know where to start..." which caused Sam to choke back a sob and made the tears run faster down her cheeks. Her neck and her faced flushed then, and Gabriel called out to Bobby.

"Where do you want me to start?" It wasn't exceptionally loud, but Sam flinched at the difference between the whispered conversation that they were having to the conversation that he was having with Bobby.

"Start from the top and work your way down. Start with her front and then loop around to the back. I'll tell you if you need to do anything further," Bobby told him calmly.

So Gabriel did. He took a few steps closer to her until there was barely any distance between them and he started his exam. The top of her head looked to be fine, there was no blood in her hair or any other lump that he could see, so he moved down to her face. Again, there were no marks and no bumps or lumps to cause alarm, so he moved down her body.

"Her neck is bruised," he told Bobby. The shape of a thumb and a few fingers were wrapped in purple around the sides of her throat. Gabriel heard what sounded like pen scratching on paper and Bobby asked him, "What color are the bruises?"

"Purple and yellow at the edges," Gabriel replied. Bobby scratched a few more things down and when he didn't hear any other questions from Bobby, he continued with his exam.

"There are two slashes on her chest, below her collarbone but above her breasts." Gabriel tried to determine how deep they were, but he didn't know how. He knew they were more than superficial, but he didn't think that they were deep enough to need stitches. Gabriel didn't hear any questions from Bobby, so he continued with, "There are bite marks...on her right breast..." Gabriel said quietly and when he looked up, he saw that Sam was as red as a tomato and that she was sobbing quietly. He looked away from her face and pretended that this was someone else in front of him. Refused to believe that this was his Sam.

He moved down and then back up her arms and found rope burns on her wrists and bruises from where he held her arms down. Once done with her arms, Gabriel looked further down her body and found a number of superficial slashes on her abdomen and one deep slash, not unlike the ones on her chest, on her left hip. He reported all of these to Bobby and then took a moment to steady himself before he moved further down to her legs.

Those legs that he loves so much had fresh wounds. The words that her father and then the fucking psycho and carved into her were fresh again. It took almost everything that Gabriel had not to get up and leave right then. The words were careful and deliberate, but there were nicks and bruises and smaller slashes all over her thighs. She had fought him through all of it, and Gabriel was equal parts grateful and astonished. Grateful because that showed that Sam didn't just take it, that maybe she still had some fight and strength in her yet. Astonished that she would take on the person that was holding her hostage even though she knew what he had in store for her.

The rest of her legs were fine, there were rope burns on her ankles, and one of her ankles was slightly swollen. When Gabriel told Bobby about her swollen ankle, he made a few notes then asked for any damage on her back. Gabriel went to move to Sam's back, and she tried to turn with him. He smiled sadly at her and moved around her to take stock of her back.

It looked as though she had received lashes. Her back was covered with criss crossing slashes from what looked like a whip. Gabriel reached out a hand to touch, then thought better of it and brought it back before asking, "Are these...Sam, are these lashes? Did he whip you?"

Sam's head sank so that her chin almost touched her chest. She nodded slightly and Gabriel inhaled sharply through his nose and left, abruptly. Sam stayed standing for a moment until she figured that he wasn't coming back and that he was done with his exam. She slipped the shirt on and curled back up into the couch. She was so tired, she realized and all she wanted to do was to sleep and pretend like this never happened. She just wanted to forget everything.

"I really hope that she never asks me to do that again, Bobby. That was traumatic. I can't even imagine that some sicko would do something like that to her. What could she have possibly done in his fucked up head to ever even come close to deserving something like that?" Gabriel ranted quietly as he finished telling Bobby the extent of Sam's injuries.

"I don't know," Bobby told him honestly. There was no explanation that the older man could give to him. It was awful, but there was nothing they could do except try to help her through it. "But you do need to tell me what happened in there."

Gabriel sighed and sat down at the table across from Bobby. He folded his hands together and told Bobby everything. Told him how Sam looked happy in the pictures that he saw, told him about the documents that he looked at, told him Lucifer's name, told him about the room that Sam was kept in, told him about killing Lucifer, told him everything. Bobby was quiet the whole time, letting Gabriel go at his own pace and when he finally finished Bobby stayed quiet, trying to process the whole thing.

"That's quite the story," was all that he said after Gabriel started looking at him expectantly. "I'll look into Lucifer and see who's going to start to miss him and see if we need to get ready to be on the run. I don't know what's going to happen, Gabe, but I'll help you out as much as I can," Bobby told him.

"I appreciate that. Thanks, Bobby," Gabriel said with a tired smile. He got up then and walked to the doorway again. He started watching Sam as she slept on the couch. She didn't look comfortable with her legs tucked up around her like that and her head angled up on the armrest as a makeshift pillow, but Gabriel didn't want to risk moving her and waking her up. So, Gabriel grabbed a spare blanket and laid that over her and started to make a nest on the ground next to the couch.

"Why don't you take my room?" Bobby asked Gabriel and Gabriel turned and stared at the older man. No one took Bobby's room. Mostly because he never offered it, but that was beside the point. Gabriel gathered his wit enough to tell him no, "I want to stay with her." Bobby seemed to understand and laid an understanding hand on Gabriel's shoulder as he passed the younger man on the way to his room.

Gabriel finished his nest and sat with his back against the bottom of the couch. He was numb, his whole body ached and all he could think about was Sam's safety. How he almost lost her, what she had to go through without him, how terrified she must have been, wondering if she would tell him what she went through...

Gabriel felt the a tear escape his eye and fall down his cheek and he didn't have the energy to wipe it away. He knew that there would be more and that there was no point in trying to stop the flood that was coming. He took a deep breath, then, and just cried. He cried over the pain that Sam had gone through, the scars that she had both physically and emotionally from her hard life, the scars physical and emotional scars that were still red and raw and painful- scars that may not ever heal and if they do, they'll be painful for the rest of her life.

Gabriel cried until he didn't know what time it was and his eyes were heavy and scratchy and he was pretty sure that there weren't even tears falling anymore when suddenly he felt a hand cup his face and a fingertip slip underneath his eye, brushing the tears away. He stopped moving. Hell, he stopped _breathing _waiting for Sam to get startled and pull away, but she surprised him by murmuring to him, "Stop."

The softness of the word and the utter surprise that Gabriel was feeling was too much and as he turned and saw Sam's rumpled hair and her sleepy eyes, he broke down again and cried. He moved to cup her cheek in return, but thought better of it. Instead he said, "I thought I lost you," and there was sheer honesty and relief in his voice.

She didn't say anything back to him, but she did move her other hand to his face and let her thumbs methodically wipe away the tear tracks that were staining his face. They stayed like that for a long time, Gabriel contorted so that he could see Sam's face and Sam leaning down to cup Gabriel's cheeks. Wether it was to make him feel better or for other reasons, he had no idea. He just knew that he never wanted Sam to stop touching him. Eventually she fought back a yawn and the spell was broken. Gabriel smiled a soft, heartbroken smile and said, "You need to rest, Sam."

She nodded and curled down into the cushions and under the blanket so that only her head peeked out of the top of the blanket and one hand off the side of the couch. Gabriel clasped the outstretched hand and Sam made a content noise as Gabriel cuddled down into his own nest. Sam was sleeping as soon as her head hit the makeshift pillow, and Gabriel was left with his thoughts again.

"Goodnight, Sam," He whispered into the night as he waited for sleep to take him.


	10. Chapter 10

_She was back there. She was back in that house, in that room with him. She looked around and saw the room again. There were still no windows, but instead of a bed she was sitting in a normal looking kitchen chair. The next thing that she saw was Luke. He was dead, that is, he still had all the holes that Gabriel put in him, but he was up and walking and bleeding all over the place. _

_"Now this, Sammy, is so much better than anything I thought of. I should have known that hurting him would be the best way to get to you," Luke told her conversationally as he walked over to the wall where Gabriel was strapped up. "Now here's the deal. Sam, I'll start with him. If you make one wrong move, I'll make you wish that you were never born." Gabriel struggled, trying to get down and trying to save her. Sam sobbed as Luke turned to Gabriel and told him, "And if I start on her and you try to stop me, I'll have you begging for death in under five minutes."_

_Sam couldn't move, couldn't breathe, with the thought of Luke hurting Gabriel. With the first scream, Sam screamed with him. She stayed in the chair as long as she could. She really did. But she couldn't watch as Luke ripped apart the one thing she let herself love. She ran across the room and pried the knife off of Gabriel's skin and suddenly it was on her own. In her muscles, through her organs, her entire being. Luke laughed at her weakness and cut into her deeper, letting his words seep into what seemed to be her very soul. _

_But what made her body blaze in agony wasn't what Luke was saying or doing. It was Gabriel agreeing with that monster with a sneer on his face. _

Sam bolted upright from the couch and her hand tugged on Gabriel's. She dropped his hand as though scalded, remembering all too vividly what had just happened in her dream. She was panting and covered in a fine sheen of sweat and the adrenaline was pumping through her veins. She scanned the room looking for Luke or for any sign that he was here.

Wait. Dream.

It was just a dream. She wasn't with Luke. She was with Bobby and Gabriel and Luke was dead and...Her eyes scanned the room again. She wanted to say that she felt safe here, but she didn't. This was the place that she was taken from. Well, taken probably wasn't the best word. It was more like was dragged silently out of the house because if she made a sound, Luke promised to kill Gabriel and Bobby slowly and then burn the house and any evidence. Coerced, might be better.

Sam wiped a hand across her face and climbed nimbly from the couch, over Gabriel, and walked toward the kitchen. She checked the room first, making sure that she was alone and then started the coffee, situating herself so that she had a clear view of the door to the outside and was within grabbing distance of the knife block. She whirled around to the door every time the breeze blew, but she was determined to have some semblance of normalcy, and damn it, that was going to start with coffee.

The determination lasted all of about five minutes until Bobby accidentally snuck up on her. She lunged for a knife and was in a defensive crouch before Bobby got out the whole greeting. Putting his hands up placatingly, Bobby edged closer to the living room where Gabriel was currently still sleeping.

"Sam," Bobby addressed her in a low voice, "put the knife down. You're fine. It's just me. I'm not going to hurt you."

Sam tried to listen to what he was saying, but she couldn't hear him over her heartbeat in her ears. She just stayed rooted to the spot brandishing the knife at the older man. It was then that Sam saw Gabriel emerge from the other room. He wasn't wearing a shirt and the jeans that he wore were slung loose around his hips; Well worn and about to rip in one knee. She immediately focused on him, and Gabriel's eyes widened with fear.

"Sam, what the hell are you doing?" Gabriel asked with a hint of panic in his voice. Sam just stared at him, which gave Bobby enough time to come up and disarm her. When the knife was safely out of her hands, Sam fell to the floor in an exhausted heap.

"All I wanted was some damn coffee," she said hopelessly to the worn down wooden floor. She felt like a failure. Hell, she couldn't even get coffee without flying into a panic. She stayed on the floor, staring at the separate slats of wood until her view was interrupted by a pair of feet. She looked up slowly and found Gabriel's hand waiting outstretched for her to take. The other hand held a steaming cup of coffee.

After taking the offered hand, Sam was helped to the kitchen table and a mug was placed in front of her. She heard Bobby grab his own cup of coffee and the paper off the porch before he walked into the living room to read in peace.

Gabriel, on the other hand, was still in the kitchen, though he was rummaging around in the cabinets and pantry. Sam was trying to look nonchalant with the whole set up and tracked him out of the corner of her eye for a while. "What are you doing?" she finally asked him when he started to assemble ingredients.

"What does it look like? I'm gathering," Gabriel told her with a smirk.

Sam rolled her eyes, and in the process scanned the room again for anything that was unusual. "Yes, I can see that, but what are you gathering? And, why are you gathering it?"

Gabriel continued his search as he answered Sam. "I am gathering eggs, salt, baking powder and soda, flour, milk, oil, water, and a few other things. As for why, I was thinking about making pancakes and bacon for breakfast."

Sam smirked at that. "You know how to cook?"

"What makes you think that I can't?" Gabriel shot back.

"Oh, I dunno, maybe because you give off the vibe that pretty much everything in your life is haphazard?"

Gabriel turned to her, "Sam, there are few things that are very important to me. One of them happens to be food. Now, when something is very important to me, I tend to take care of it and treat it right, so, when I prepare food that I'm going to eat, its going to be damn near amazing," and with that, Gabriel turned back to the ingredients that he was mixing, leaving Sam to blush and gape at his back.

The rest of the prep time was quiet. Sam went back to her coffee, but now she was openly watching Gabriel create. There was a focus to his actions that she had never seen before. Granted, she hadn't really known him for that long, but she didn't think that it was possible to get that kind of focus out of him.

She watched the way that his muscles moved under his skin as she sipped at her cooling coffee. Gabriel was something of an enigma to her, and she really wanted to unravel the mystery that surrounded him. She really didn't know anything about him; where he came from, what he did for a living, what his hobbies were, nothing. But he knew so much of her past...

"If you keep thinking that hard, your head is going to explode," Gabriel told her with a smirk as he set down a stack of chocolate chip pancakes. Her coffee was cold now and she had only sipped about half of it up, but the pancakes looked hot and delicious as she watched some of the syrup drip down the side of the stack. When she looked back up, Gabriel was refilling her cup and bringing a stack of pancakes twice as high as hers to the table. "Well? Dig in."

Sam looked at him, then to the pancakes in front of her, then to the pancakes in front of him, then back to him.

"Well, let's see you finish those, then you can have some more," Gabriel told her with a grin and the small grin that Sam gave in return was fragile, but real, and made Gabriel smile even bigger. He began to shovel food into his mouth to cover the grin that threatened to split his face in two and watched surreptitiously as Sam poked and prodded at her own stack of pancakes. When she finally did decide to take a bite of them, her eyes widened as she stopped chewing and looked to Gabriel.

"This is one of the best things I have ever eaten," she told him seriously.

"I told you, I'm serious about the things that are important to me," he said with a shit eating grin and continued to shovel food into his mouth.

Sam began eating with renewed vigor. She didn't stop for coffee, or for any conversation that Gabriel tried to start. Hell, she barely even came up for air.

Gabriel watched her finish her pancakes and took her plate when she indicated she was done. He refilled his own cup of coffee and looked to Sam over the top of it. She seemed more at ease now than she did when he had first woken up; she was giving small smiles here and there and even engaging in banter. That was enough to make Gabriel smile to himself and think that maybe getting Sam back wasn't going to be so hard after all. "So what were you thinking about while I was cooking?" he asked her after taking a sip from his cup.

Sam looked down and studied the table for a moment before answering. "That I know nothing about you. That you know so much about me, but I really don't have the first clue about you," Sam told him honestly.

Gabriel thought for a moment then asked, "Well, is there anything that you would like to know?"

Sam twisted her hands around the mug in front of her and asked, "Who are you? Is Gabriel your real name? Where do you come from? What's your family like? What do you do for a living? Do you have any hobbies?" She didn't realize it until the end, but all the questions came out in a rush and that made it sound like she was dying to ask. She wasn't, really, she was just mildly curious. But it all came out at once making it sound like a flood of questions. Sam flushed a little at the idea that she sounded that desperate to ask.

Gabriel answered them calmly, though. "I'm Gabriel: the guy who has saved your ass twice now. Yes, Gabriel is my real name. I come from...well, I come from somewhere far away. My family is the definition of dysfunctional. I was in my family's business, but then quit and i've been living off of that for the past few weeks and I have a few hobbies, the top few including food, sex and jokes, but not necessarily in that order."

Sam just looked at him for a few moments longer before he asked, "Is there anything else you wanted to ask?"

She shook her head no and Gabriel got up and left the table. Even though he tried to hide it, she knew that she had upset him with the questions about his family. She let him walk away and digested the information that she had received.


	11. Chapter 11

Gabriel was sitting in his room under the window with a pen in hand and a newspaper sitting on his lap opened to the classified section. He sighed as he read through another ad for an apartment. Between the sketchy locations and the even sketchier grammar that he's seen, he's pretty sure that he's never going to find a place so that he can move out of Bobby's. He drew an X through the latest ad, closed his eyes and let his head fall back gently against the windowsill behind him.

He stayed like that for a long time, letting the sun play across his face and wondering what he was going to do about moving. He knew that he had to get out of Bobby's place, but he needed a place where Sam felt safe. Where she could come home and let her guard down; where she could laugh and smile. A place where she could feel safe enough to wake up in the morning after a full night sleep and walk around in little to no clothing, and kiss and touch and play...

That is, he needed a place where Sam felt safe _if _Sam was going to go with him. If she didn't want to leave, he could just buy a place that was cheap and decent enough that he didn't think that he was going to be murdered as an innocent bystander and that would be good enough for him. But he didn't want that. He wanted Sam to come with him. He wanted Sam to to be with him because he know that he could keep Sam safe.

He sighed again and heard the door creak open. Gabriel cracked an eye and saw Sam's face peek around the door frame. "Hey, kiddo," Gabriel said quietly into the room. "Fancy seeing you here. What brings you to the top floor?"

"...Bobby went out for a 'supply run'. I didn't want to be alone down there, so I came and found you..." Sam said with a little bit of hesitation, as though she wasn't sure that it was okay to go to him if she was scared.

Gabriel beckoned her in and she moved to sit close to, but not next to him. She looked at the newspaper that was laying on the floor between them and began to study the blurbs that were crossed out. Her brow furrowed and she turned the paper toward her and began reading all the blurbs on the page.

Gabriel answered her unspoken question. "I'm looking for an apartment, Sam," and as he said that her eyes shot up to meet his and there was a sympathetic look in his eyes. "I can't stay at Bobby's forever. I need to get a job and to have my own place to go back to."

"Ah," Sam said, "I see." There was a detached quality to her voice as she took up the paper and read through the blurbs. Gabriel wanted to tell her what he wanted and he was just getting the wording right when her eyebrows raised as she read through the ads and then decided on one. "This one sounds nice: '1 bedroom'-"

"Sam," Gabriel interrupted her, but she just kept reading.

"1 bath-"

"Sam..."

"Ooh, look, laundry is included, too." Sam said sarcastically.

"Sam!" Gabriel said forcefully and Sam jumped and immediately put her chin to her chest and became as small as possible. _Submissive_ Gabriel's brain supplied. He shook his head in anger, thinking that he was a fucking moron for yelling at her like that, but quietly sighed and turned to face her. He slowly out two fingers under her chin and brought her face up to see his. A tear rolled down her cheek and her face was white, but she still had defiance in her gaze. When he knew that she was paying full attention, Gabriel slowly slid his hand so that his palm was cradling her face and looked into her eyes. "I want you to come with me."

Sam froze. "What?" Sam asked and she dropped the paper next to her.

"I want you to come with me," he told her again. It took all the strength that he had not to let the words that he was thinking tumble out of his mouth. He wanted to tell her that he could keep her safe, that he could make sure that she had a place to heal from what had happened. "I need a haven from everything else, and frankly, so do you."

He wanted to say more, but Sam was in his space. Her face was inches from his, her head tilted to the side in confusion.

"Why didn't you tell me?" She asked him, and they were so close that her breath danced across his lips. It felt like a warm breeze after a spring rain and Gabriel wanted to get lost in it.

"I didn't want to scare you away," he answered mindlessly.

She closed the last few inches of space and he stayed perfectly still. Sam just swept her lips against his. It was barely a kiss, more of the briefest meeting of mouths, but Gabriel's blood was on fire from it. He desperately wanted more; wanted to pillage her mouth and wrap his arms around her and look at her mouth all red and bruised from his kisses and watch her come undone again and again. But he stayed still for now and just let her kiss him and barely kissed her back.

She drew back, then, and looked into his eyes with a small smile. "You wouldn't have. You make me feel safe," she told him.

Gabriel was exhausted by the time that he fell onto his bed later that night. He and Sam had been going through ads all day and they had made plans to go to all of those apartments within the next two days. Which was okay when there were only a few places. But then there were upwards of ten apartments all over the downtown area, it got a little intense. Thank god Bobby came back when he did, or else he would probably still be looking through ads.

Bobby was really good about the whole thing, too. When Gabriel pulled him aside to tell him that he was looking at other places to live, Bobby just gave him a look that said _Well no shit ya idjit, I didn't think that you were gonna stay here forever_. When Gabriel told him that he was thinking about taking Sam, Bobby gave him a variation of the same look that said _Well no shit, ya idjit, she wasn't gonna stay here with me_. Gabriel didn't think before that it was a big deal, but after getting that response from him was a huge weight off of his chest.

So, Gabriel was exhausted. All he wanted to do was to take a shower and to lay down and to sleep for a good week. He had just decided to pull his ass off of the bed and was stripping off his shirt to get ready for a shower when he heard a quiet knock on his door.

"Yeah," Gabriel sighed as he turned toward the door and found Sam there in her pajamas. A short, light pink nightgown trimmed in black lace that he had bought her on a whim what seemed like ages ago. Gabriel couldn't breathe for a moment and Sam looked down at the floor before she spoke.

"...I can't stay in my room," she told the floorboards. It was meant for Gabriel, but Sam couldn't bring her gaze to his. Gabriel made his way over to Sam and tilted her chin up to meet his gaze.

"What can I do, Sam?"

Sam tried to look anywhere but Gabriel's eyes. "I was wondering if...could I stay with you tonight? I'll sleep on the floor, I promise not to take up a lot of space-"

"Sam," Gabriel said and Sam stopped and looked to Gabriel's eyes. "It's fine. Of course you can stay with me. And no, you're not sleeping on the floor. I'm going to take a shower, but feel free to curl up in bed, okay?"

She nodded and Gabriel gathered the rest of his clothing and a towel before heading off to the bathroom. He tiredly turned the water on as hot as it would go, stripped off the rest of his clothing and stepped under the scalding hot spray. He hissed as the water hit his skin and slowly sank into the steady stream, allowing his muscles to relax.

As he ran the bar of soap over his body, Gabriel thought about what he was going to do about Sam. He felt strongly for her, but he wasn't necessarily in the right place to start trying to whisk her off her feet. He was, after all, running from is own demons. Between his missing father and his brothers Mike and Rafe who was equal parts controlling, easily enraged and blindly loyal he realized that he needed to split before someone got killed. So he tucked tail and ran; kept his first name and changed almost everything else about himself. He still didn't know if they were looking for him to drag him back into that life that fell apart so long ago, or if they had just given up and assumed him dead.

He stepped under the spray again to rinse the suds from his body and thought about Sam. She was right, she knew nothing about him. But that was the way that he wanted to keep it for now. She was the one that he was worried about, and if she felt safe with the person that he was now, there was no way that he was going to go back to the blindly loyal pathetic person he was before. She was too important to him to lose.

He sighed then and stepped out of the spray and leaned against the shower wall. He didn't want to get out of the shower yet and deal with his life, so he stayed in the sauna that he had created for himself and let his mind wander. Not surprisingly, he thought of Sam. The way that she smiled around him, the way that she wanted to be near him, the thought that she was in his room right now waiting for him to come back...

His dick gave an interested twitch at the thought of Sam waiting in his bed in that tiny nightgown. The way that it would scrunch up her thighs as she slept, the way that the satin clung to her skin...God she was gorgeous in his minds eye, with sleepy eyes and tussled hair.

Gabriel let his fingertips run down his chest slowly and imagined that they were Sam's; imagining that she would smile and feign innocence when he accused her of being a tease. His fingers trailed lightly down his now fully erect dick and started a painfully slow pace. He still thought of Sam; he thought of her hands, then her mouth around his aching cock; she would be tentative at first, but would gain confidence and his pace got faster and faster according to his fantasy. He came with her name on his lips and a groan of satisfaction as he felt the aftershocks run through his body.

After he was sure that he could get his body to function, he turned off the spray (which was now lukewarm at best) and got out of the shower. He toweled off and slipped into a pair of sleep pants and walked out of the bathroom.

Sam was sitting against the far wall of the hallway watching the door intently with a glint in her eyes and a small smirk on her face.


	12. Chapter 12

A/N: Sorry about the wait, guys. I had a terrible week, and there are a whole lot of reasons that you don't want to hear about. But here it is. It ends a little earlier than I wanted it to, but I promise to make up for it. Here ya go!

Gabriel's room had a strange quality to it. When he was in it, it felt safe and cozy; almost like a nest at the top of a tree. However, when Gabriel wasn't in it it felt like an attic; a room at the top of a house with no way of getting out except for the roof (and that was pretty much a death sentence in every horror movie ever made). It wasn't an abrupt change either. It was a slow, creeping, inexorable change in perception until it was all of a sudden overwhelming.

Or at least, that was Sam's perception of the room. So when Gabriel left, she went and sat on his bed and was fine as long as the room smelled like him. But when the smell started to dissipate; when the attic stopped looking like a haven and more like a prison, Sam ran from the room. She blindly went to the bathroom and stood outside the door for a long time wanting desperately for Gabriel to come out so she could throw her arms around him. But the longer she waited, the more ridiculous she felt and eventually she went and sat on the far side of the hallway and tried to figure out what she would say to him when he came out.

She was deep in thought when she heard soft moans of appreciation. They were quiet, almost drowned out by the patter of the water on the floor of the shower. She heard them again and all of a sudden realized what she was hearing. She turned beet red and was frozen to the floor. She couldn't leave if she wanted to, but she realized then that there was a part of her that wanted to know what Gabriel sounded like when he came. That thought alone should have ripped her from the floor but instead it cemented her even more. She waited and she listened and she wasn't disappointed.

Gabriel was vocal. Every few moments there was a new noise pulled from his mouth. Some sounded as though they were coaxed from him, others like they were ripped from him. They started low and quiet and got closer together and louder and Sam wasn't ashamed to say that she was getting wet from the whole idea. Sam listening to Gabriel on the other side of the door touching himself. What was he thinking about? What were his fantasies? Was he thinking about her?

And with perfect timing, Gabriel came with a name ripped from his throat, her name. It took Sam a moment to process that. He was thinking of her. Sam blushed lightly and slapped a smirk onto her face with a look in her eyes that said Yes, I Did In Fact Hear What You Just Did look on her face when Gabriel opened the door. It took him a moment to figure out what he wanted to say which gave her enough time to let her eyes travel slowly over his torso and back up again to his face.  
"What are you doing down here, Sam?"

"I got scared," Sam told him honestly. "I wanted to be near you."

Gabriel looked at her for a moment longer before deciding something and said, "Alright. Let's get you situated upstairs."

They walked up to the attic silently, but the silence wasn't uncomfortable, it was just silence. Sam watched him as he walked into the room first and gestured to his bed. She sat down and continued watching as he went over to his trunk, pulled out a pair of sleep pants and slipped them on underneath the towel and promptly ditched the towel. Gabriel walked to another box then and started unrolling a sleeping bag. Once he had situated the sleeping bag on the ground, he looked to Sam who tossed him a pillow. Sam started to get up and move to the sleeping bag but Gabriel stopped her. "I told you that you're taking the bed," he said.

"I don't want to impose," she told him.

"You're not," he responded as he opened the sleeping and slipped inside. "Do you need anything else?" He asked her once he got relatively comfortable on the floor.  
"No, I think I'm okay," She told him quietly, though she didn't make a move to get into the bed. "...Thanks, Gabe. It means a lot to me that you let me crash here," she whispered. She half hoped that he didn't hear it, but when she looked at him, he was giving her a oft smile.

"Not a problem kiddo."

She pulled back the covers and slipped into the bed, not missing the way that Gabriel's eyes got just a little bigger when the nightgown slipped up her thighs a little bit. She smiled to herself as she rolled so that she was on her side curled into a ball facing the wall. "Night, Gabe," she said sleepily.

"Night, Sam," he responded as he closed his eyes and waited for sleep to take him.

It wasn't even a few hours later that he woke up to the sound of whimpering coming from the bed. Gabriel got up in a sleep induced haze and stumbled over to the bed to see what was wrong.

She was curled into a tight ball and she was jerking violently as though someone was jabbing at her with a knife. Gabriel wanted to shake her awake, but he was afraid that if she woke up then she wouldn't fall asleep again or that she would just have the same nightmares again. He sat down on the side of the bed and swept the hair from her face as he contemplated what he should do. She surprised him, though, when she reached up in her sleep and grabbed his hand and snuggled it, effectively keeping him a prisoner there.

Well, this could be worse, he thought to himself as he tried to extricate his hand from her grip. The problem was that she wouldn't let go. It seemed that every time he went to move his hand her grip constricted just a little more. He sighed as he realized that the easiest way to deal with this would be to just lay next to her on the bed, which he did. The only way for both of them to fit would be to lay as close to her as he could, so he moulded his body against her's with the layer of blankets between them. As he was laying there wishing for a pillow and waiting to fall asleep again, he realized that Sam hadn't been twitching since she grabbed his hand.  
The grin that lit his face was as bright as the sun.

When Sam woke the next morning and realized that there was another person in her bed. A very male shaped person that was curled right next to her underneath the covers pressed tightly against her with his arm thrown over her waist. In a sleepy haze, she thought that the only male shaped person that would be sleeping next to her was Luke, and that thought made her promptly freak the fuck out.

She whipped her arms out from underneath the covers and clambered on top of him, pinning his wrists to the bed. She was panting and glaring down at him, riding out the adrenalin rush when she actually gained enough brain function to realize that something was wrong here. The guy that she was on top of wasn't...firm enough. Luke was covered in muscle, this guy had a thin layer of fat that made him a little softer than what she was expecting. Also, he was shorter than Luke. By about a foot.

"Mmm...I like a morning full of kinky, but this is a little odd for me," Gabriel told her in a voice that was sleep rough and sent a shiver down her spine.  
"I...I'm sorry," Sam told him as she climbed off of him and fixed the strap that had slid down her shoulder in her sleep. "I thought...I thought that you were Luke...he was the only one I spent the night with."

"I didn't mean to startle you," he told her. "You were having a nightmare last night and I went to wake you, but you kind of took my hand prisoner. Though I did start out on top of the covers. I'm not really sure how I ended up spooning you," he told her with an adorably confused look on his face.

She grinned, "Obviously you couldn't resist my ridiculously hot bod."

"Yeah, whatever hot shot. Let's just get breakfast before I have to jump you," Gabriel said with a joking leer and slid out of the bed gracefully and walked to the door. "You comin'?"

"I think that this is the one," Sam said to Gabriel at the seventh apartment.

"Are you sure? Because you said that about the last one," Gabriel said with a hint of venom in his voice. It was a little uncalled for, but because she thought that the last one was 'the one' they spent way longer there than they were supposed to and missed lunch. A hungry Gabriel is a cranky Gabriel and Sam was just beginning to learn that.

"Yeah," Sam told him as she spun around in a circle in the middle of the living room. "This is way better than the last one."

"Well yeah, I agree. But this one is on the fourth floor, and even though it has roof access it's going to be a bitch if the elevator is out."

"Free laundry," Sam countered.

"On the edge of downtown," Gabriel reminded her.

"I'm sure that I can manage riding a bike to whatever job I find."

"Not near a grocery store," Gabriel was running out of things to dissuade her about this apartment. Not that it was bad. It was near downtown but not right in the middle of it. It was clean and it was cheap and it was a lot of what both of them were looking for.

"It's near a farmers market that sets up every Saturday. You might just have to start eating healthy for once," she told him with a faux horrified look and a twinkle in her eyes.

"Only if you make it worth my while," Gabriel quipped and Sam blushed lightly.

"...I hate to break this up," the landlord broke into the banter, "But does that mean that you want to take it?"

Gabriel looked at Sam who nodded. Gabriel turned back to the landlord and answered, "We would like to make a deposit on it, please."

"Alright then. Why not step down into my office and we'll discuss the rental agreement."


	13. Chapter 13

That night was spent taking 20 minutes to pack Sam's meager belongings, opening a bottle of sweet red wine and splitting it with Gabriel, getting lost in argument and brainstorming lists that they would need, spending three hours packing Gabriel's things (because somehow even though Gabriel came to Bobby's place with all of his things in boxes, he managed to completely unpack himself and spread all of his things around the third floor) and the rest of the night was spent with pen to paper.

Well, the idea was to spend the rest of the night with pen to paper. They had a few lists: Things they would have to save for, Things that needed to be bought immediately, Things they would need to buy eventually, et cetera. Of course, they were adults and there was a liquor cabinet and Gabriel had the maturity of about a teenager. That level of maturity was what Sam was trying to argue against at the moment.

"Gabriel, there is no need for rosemary _and_ sage _and _thyme."

"Of course there is. Do you cook on a regular basis?"

"Well, no," Sam said as she sloshed the wine in her glass as she pointed to Gabriel. "But I think that _you_ will not need _all_ of them."

"Okay, I acknowledge that you have no idea what you're talking about and that I can't make you understand until you try it. So why not move on to something we can agree on?"

Sam just shook her head and giggled as she flipped to the next page on her legal pad. "Alright. How about, 'Things that we need to buy eventually'?"

"Seems harmless enough. Let's try it," Gabriel said dryly.

"Okay. Couch," Sam says and moves to write it on the list and Gabriel makes a face as he hisses his discontent. "What?" Sam asked.

"I think that that should be something that we should buy immediately," Gabriel told her with his nose still wrinkled.

"Well...it's between a couch and a fridge," she told him flatly and she watched him physically pale at the idea of not having a fridge.

"On second thought, the couch can wait," Gabriel told her around a comical gulp.

"Thought so," Sam sing-songed as she added a couch to the list of things that needed to be acquired later. She was flushed just lightly from the wine and the color on her face was refreshing and arousing. She was so happy and alive and it made Gabriel want to kill the bastard who did this to her over and over again, but at the same time it made Gabriel want to be a better person just to keep that smile on her face.

She was saying something and waving a hand in front of his face when he came back to reality. "What?" Gabriel replied.

"I was asking if I have to make you choose between a table and a guest bed," Sam said after a sip of wine.

Gabriel gave her a puzzled look. "Why on Earth do we need a guest bed?"

"Well, unless you want me to sleep on our nonexistent couch, I need a place to sleep."

"You're sleeping in the bed obviously."

"...So, we're not having a table?"

"No, we're having a table. You're sleeping with me."

Sam spluttered the wine that she was drinking, almost choking on it. "_Come again?"_

"Sam," Gabriel told her as though he was explaining to a child. "You have slept next to me, or at least in the same room as me, every night since..." Gabriel let the sentence trail off, not wanting to poke at still healing scars. "Anyway," Gabriel found a second wind and began again. "Would you really do well in a new room alone?"

Sam thought about this as she sipped on her wine. She wanted to be angry with him, but he really had a point. She did spend a lot of time with him, and she did sleep near him every night. He felt safe, and she slept better when he was around. So instead of shutting Gabriel out, Sam took a chance and opened up more than she has in a long time.

"You know, you have a point." She said as she twirled her glass slowly. "I'm a bed hog and I have a tendency to kick anyone I sleep with," she told him.

"...I think I can work with that," he told her with a smirk on his face. Inside though, he was reeling in the best way possible. He seriously thought that he was going to get shut out because of that last statement, but she let him in. Was it out of the ever present fear or was it because she wanted to be close to him?

She smiled at him and went back to her lists. "So, anything else that we need to buy eventually?"

Sam was curled up in bed the next morning with her head burrowed underneath her pillow. She didn't really remember how she got into bed, but she definitely remembered how much she drank and she was trying desperately to figure out why she didn't stop earlier. She slowly uncovered her head and blinked an eye open, hissing when the sunlight came in and blinded her temporarily. She flopped back down onto her pillow and groaned at the headache that was building behind her eyes and seemed to have the rest of her head in a vice grip.

"Coffee," she spoke blearily to the empty room. She crawled out of bed and walked downstairs to the kitchen. She shivered at the cool tiles of the floor and walked blindly toward the counter and promptly ran into a far too cheery Gabriel.

"Mornin' kiddo," Gabriel greeted, and Sam felt the urge to punch him in the face for being so awake.

She grunted at him, and he smiled as he maneuvered a cup of coffee into her hands and turned her in the direction of the table. She walked until she bumped into the table and sank down onto the chair.

"Feelin' that wine today?" Gabriel said with a smirk in his voice.

"Ungh," Sam grunted at him.

"I have just the thing," Gabriel told her and placed a plate of bacon in front of her.

"Unnnnnngh," Sam moaned as she scrunched her face into disgust and shoved the plate away, almost knocking it to the floor.

"Not a greasy breakfast kind of person while hung over?"

"Toast," Sam managed.

"Ah," Gabriel said as he turned around to get the toaster.

Sam focused on her coffee then as Gabriel made her dry toast. She was just got halfway done with the coffee and was feeling slightly more human when Gabriel placed the toast in front of her. Sam nibbled the first piece and gobbled down the second. She was just finishing the last of her coffee when a glass of water and two pills were set down in front of her.

"For the headache," Gabriel told her.

"Thanks. How much did we have to drink last night?"

"Well, we split three bottles of wine, so it was probably one and a half each."

"And how are you not feeling as bad as I am?"

"Because I," Gabriel told her with a grin, "have godlike powers and it takes a hell of a lot more than that to get me as hammered as you were."

"You don't have to be a jerk about it," Sam told him as she got up to put the coffee cup in the sink.

"Where are you going?" Gabriel asked her.

"I feel like death warmed over," Sam told him bluntly. "I need a shower."

"Well, have fun with that," Gabriel smirked. "Do you want me to come get you if it's been a while?" Gabriel asked with genuine concern in his voice.

"...Yeah," Sam told him. She probably wouldn't need it, but it was nice to know that he was there is she needed it.

"Alright," Gabriel smiled at her softly as she turned to walk away.

Sam wasn't lying, she did feel like death warmed over, but she knew that as soon as she got out of the shower and brushed her teeth she would feel infinitely better. This wasn't her first hangover by a long shot, and she knew how to make herself feel better after years of practice. She closed the door firmly behind her and stripped out of her clothes and turned the water on. As she was waiting for it to warm up, she looked over her body.

It had been about a month since Lucifer coerced her to go with him and she had to say that her marks were healing nicely. The lacerations on her abdomen had healed nicely and were now rough pink marks on her tanned skin. The swollen ankle was just twisted and didn't hurt any longer, it was just stiff from time to time in the morning. All of her rope burns were now just slightly darker scars and the words carved into her legs were starting to heal over nicely. She tried to turn and look at her back, but she couldn't get a good angle. She figured that they were healing okay because she hadn't woken up in a puddle of blood and her back was a little stiff, as though the skin was new and tight still.

She grudgingly stopped looking at her wounds in the mirror and sighed when she got into the shower and the water hit her skin. It was hot, but not scalding and it immediately made her muscles and skin start to relax. She stayed under the stream for a while and just let the water work it's magic before washing up quickly. She was reluctant to get out of the shower, but heard a sharp knock on the door.

"Sam, come on, we have to get started moving our stuff into the apartment," Gabriel called from the other side of the door.

"Coming," Sam shouted over the water and through the door. She reluctantly turned the water off and stepped out into the mini sauna that she had created and wrapped a towel around her body. She shivered as she opened the door and the cooler air hit her skin. She jogged up the stairs to get a new set of clothes from her boxes, but stopped abruptly when she opened the door to find Gabriel completely naked.

Her thoughts hadn't done him justice.

His chest was even better than she remembered. It was muscular, but not overly so. _Toned_, her mind helpfully supplied. His whole body was like that; toned from head to foot. He was frozen midway through a turn and Sam stood there gaping as she realized that he wasn't necessarily proportional. But in a good way.

"Uh...sorry, Sam. If you could give me just a sec..." Gabriel told her.

Sam finally figured out how to expel air from her lungs again and she turned beet red as she spluttered. "Uh, yeah. Sorry, I didn't mean to...I thought...Ugh, I'm...I'm just gonna go..." She said with her eyes glued to the floor as she retreated out the door and shut it firmly behind her. She thought that she would die of embarrassment as she thought of herself obviously ogling Gabe.

It wasn't long before the door opened and Gabriel came out, blessedly (or not depending upon how you looked at it) fully clothed. He didn't make eye contact as he passed and said, "I'll just wait here and then we can start moving boxes."

"Alright," She told him with relative ease as she slipped into the room and shut the door softly. It wasn't until she had the towel off and she was bent over rummaging through her box of belongings that she heard Gabriel's voice float through the closed door.

"You know, if we're going to be living together, we're bound to see each other naked."

Sam thought about that for a moment before she answered. "I know."

"...Is that going to be a problem?" He asked tentatively and she couldn't really discern the intent of the question.

"You know, if that is a question of 'Do you want to get naked with me?' this really isn't the right time," she told him.

"I mean to ask, are you going to go into panic mode if I accidentally walk in on you in the middle of you changing your clothes," he clarified and the breath that she had been unconsciously holding was released.

"No," she answered him definitively. "If you were being a super creep and just watching me while I was in the shower or something, then we would have a problem. But if it's an accident, then it should be fine," she said as she walked toward the door and opened it. She had pulled on one of her favorite pair of jeans and a plaid button up that had the first two buttons undone giving a pretty impressive view of her cleavage. Her hair was pulled up and her trusty Chucks on her feet. "I'm sorry I didn't knock. I thought that you would be done by the time I go up here."

"No worries, kiddo. I hope you know that you're going to have to return the favor, though," he said with an eyebrow wiggle.

"Uh huh. Sure," Sam said with a grin as she sauntered back into the room to grab some boxes. "You coming?" She asked over her shoulder.

"Yeah, yeah," Gabriel told her with a smirk. "Just admiring the view," he added under his breath.

Sam turned red as she walked out of the attic and down to the truck.

It was close to dinner time by the time that they were done moving all of Gabriel's things into the apartment and back to Bobby's. Bobby was back from the clinic by the time that they were done, and was just putting a casserole in the oven.

"It'll be about a half hour," Bobby told them both as they walked in the door. "Grab a beer and sit down."

They did and Bobby joined them shortly after that. They sat around the living room and talked as though they had known each other for years. It was interesting; Sam fit into this odd little family better than she ever could have dreamed. She owed these people so much, and yet she felt as though to them, it wasn't a big deal. That they just wanted her to be safe, and they would do anything to make sure that that happened.

She wanted to say something, but before she could, the oven bell rang signaling that the casserole was done. Bobby and Gabriel both got up to finish dinner; Bobby took the casserole out and started to serve it while Gabriel got out plates and silverware. Sam followed them into the kitchen, deep in thought. She took a plate full of food from Bobby and sat down at the table, engaging in the conversation that was going on around her.

The food was delicious and there wasn't a lot of conversation once everyone had a taste of what was on the plates in front of them. After all the food was eaten, the dishes were collected and Sam washed them. She listened to Gabriel and Bobby murmuring to each other in the living room and she lost herself to the whims of her brain and let her hands mindlessly wash the dishes.

"I've been looking into Lucifer," Bobby was telling Gabriel, "And as far as I can tell, no one's lookin' for him. In fact, I don't think that anyone knows that he's dead 'cept his minions."

Gabriel looked puzzled. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, it's been a month, and his bank account is still active, he's still getting and sending mail...It sounds crazy, but I think that someone 'takin' his place," Bobby told him."

Gabriel thought for a moment, then said. "I know that it's asking a lot, but if you could keep an eye on that, I would appreciate it," he said quietly.

" 'Course," Bobby replied.

It wasn't much longer until Gabriel was telling Sam that they needed to go back to their new place. Sam made sure thought that she went to Bobby before she left and told him, "You know, I'm eternally grateful for you taking me in. I...I don't know where I'd be without you, and I...I can't tell you how much your kindness has influenced me. You are a wonderful person and I wanted to say that I am forever in your debt," Sam told him.

To his credit, Bobby just waved it off and told Sam that she owed him and that was that. There was no fanfare, just a promise of 'you owe me if ever the time comes'. Sam agreed and soon she and Gabriel were on their way to their new apartment.

It was a quick to the outskirts of town and to their complex. They made the walk the stairs to the fifth floor in silence, both having a lot on their mind. The silence wasn't heavy, it was just there. Comfortable, even. Gabriel unlocked the door with a muttered promise that she would get a key soon, and they made their way to the bedroom, Gabriel stripping as he went. Sam stripped when Gabriel went to brush his teeth, swapping places when Gabriel came in to the bedroom to throw some sweatpants on. Soon enough they were slipping under the covers of the king size bed.

It seemed as though Sam was getting lost in all of the blankets and it kind of scared her. She soon found herself reaching for Gabe and scooting closer to his side of the bed. It wasn't until she found her way into his arms that she could relax enough to start to fall asleep.

"Goodnight, Gabe," Sam whispered into the darkness, and Gabriel's arms tightened around her middle as he whispered back to her.

"Goodnight, Sam," he replied and listened and felt her breathing as she slowly fell into sleep.


	14. Chapter 14

Sam woke up with an uneasy feeling in her stomach. She knew that she had a nightmare, but she couldn't remember what it was about. There was something about pain and humiliation and Lucifer, but she wasn't really sure what the story was. Gabriel was there too, though she thought that she remembered him screaming, maybe begging? She felt exhausted; as though she hadn't slept at all and wiped a hand down her face to dislodge some of the sleep that still clung to her eyes.

When she did manage to pry her eyes open, she sat bolt upright in bed. She didn't recognize this place. She had no idea where she was, and that was terrifying. Last time she woke up in a place she didn't know, she had passed out and there were three guys over her with their pants down. _"_Gabe?" She called into the room with a hint of panic in her voice.

Gabriel inhaled and rolled over to reach for her arm. "What, Sammy?" He asked her with a voice that was sleep rough and heavy.

She sighed as she began waking up a little more. She remembered now, looking down at Gabe, that they were in their bed, in their apartment. That she wasn't staying at Bobby's anymore and that she was safe as long as she was with Gabriel. "Nothing," Sam told him with a small smile. "I just woke up a little disoriented."

"Are you okay?" Gabriel mumbled as he went to burrow back into the comforter.

"...Yeah," Sam told him as she slipped out of bed and went to the kitchen to make coffee.

"Where you goin'?" Gabriel asked her when she reached the doorway of their room. Only the top of his head was poking out of the comforter, but his eyes were watching her with a quizzical look.

"Coffee," she told him as she continued to walk to the kitchen. It was a simple plan in her mind; get to the coffee maker, start it, maybe have some toast. She didn't factor in, though, that there would be boxes everywhere. "Shit," she whispered under her breath as she stubbed her toe on the boxes that were strewn about the hallway and the kitchen. "Fucking hell. We couldn't unpack, could we?"

She continued muttering under her breath until she found the coffee maker and coffee and set the machine up. It must have been louder, or at least more angry than she originally thought, because Gabriel shuffled to the doorway of the kitchen after a few minutes. "Sammy?"

"Don't call me that," Sam growled at him as she waited for the coffee to perk.

Gabriel ignored that and barreled on. "Why are you slamming things around?"

"I'm not," Sam told him.

"You are. Otherwise I would be asleep right now."

"I can't help that you wake up whenever you hear the wind blow."

"I don't," Gabriel told her. "I do wake up, though, when it sounds like there is a bomb being dropped in the kitchen."

"Well, there's not. You can go back to sleep now."

"I'm good," Gabriel told her.

"Are you always this annoying in the morning?"

"Are you planning on jumping down my throat every morning?"

Sam was about to continue fighting with him, but the coffee pot beeped signaling that the coffee was done. Sam rummaged around in the boxes for a mug and poured herself a cup of coffee leaving some of the coffee in the carafe. She leaned against the counter as she sipped at the cup, savoring the taste on her tongue. "That depends," she told him after she swallowed, "are you going to try to talk to me after I've been sufficiently caffeinated?" She could have said it with malice and anger, but it came out more in a quiet teasing manner.

Gabriel looked at her and smiled, "Nah, I think I learned my lesson." He walked over to the boxes that adorned the floor, swiftly pulled out a mug and then walked to the counter and made himself his own cup of coffee. They sat in silence just waking up with one another, and though he thought that it was a little too soon for this kind of thinking, it was nice. It was nice to have someone to share in the silence with. It wasn't so oppressive if it was a shared silence.

After about a half hour, Sam put her empty coffee cup down and looked to Gabriel. "I'm gonna look for a job today," she told him. He looked up from the sip of coffee that he was about to take with the cup frozen just in front of his lips.

"Yeah?" he asked her with a bit of surprise in his voice. Honestly, he was sure that she would wait a while longer. Not that he was complaining. His bank account would thank her for it, but he was fully ready and waiting for her to get settled, comfortable, with where she was now.

"Yeah...I mean, this apartment is just as expensive as your last one, and you said that the reason that you wanted me to move in with you was so that I could help with the rent..." she trailed off still looking at him.

"Alright," Gabriel told her. "If were going to tell each other our plans for the day, then I might go and see Bobby. Otherwise I'm going to be here. I'll probably unpack. You want me to start unloading-"

"No," Sam told him before he could finish the question.

"...Alright," Gabriel said after a moment. There was a pause and then Sam went back into their room to change out of her pajamas, take a shower and put on some real clothes.

"Well, Sam, we aren't really in need of a waitress," the short guy in front of her told her, "but if you have any bar tending skill, we could use you." He looked as though he had just rolled out of bed and grabbed whatever clothes were laying around. A little jumpy; he was looking around at every small noise that he heard. Other than that he seemed as though he was a pretty normal guy. Maybe not enough sleep, but what can you do?

"I've had some, yeah. Though I might need a refresher course," she told the guy sitting in front of her.

"We'll get you trained up," the guy, her new boss, told him.

"Thank you so much, Mr. Shurley," Sam told him as she got up to shake his hand.

"Chuck," he said as he took her hand to shake it.

"Chuck," she repeated with a smile.

"We'll get you in at some point to train and fill out some paperwork. Be on the lookout for our call, and welcome to The Gates."

As Sam stepped out onto the sidewalk outside of Gates, she realized that she was pretty content. Yes, she was still freaking out internally over Lucifer and making sure that she was looking over her shoulder surreptitiously just in case, but overall, she was okay. She was in a new place, with a new person who has shown over and over that she can trust him, she had a job and a place to live, hell, what more could a person want?

She was so caught up in her thoughts that it wasn't long before she realized that she had walked past her building. Shaking her head, she doubled back and stepped into the lobby of the building. It wasn't until she was in the stairwell halfway to her floor that she realized she recognized the man that was walking along side her but on the other side of the road. She flew up the last of the stairs and barreled into the small apartment.

"Sam?" Gabriel asked her as she ran through the door and toward the window in the kitchen looking down onto the street below. "Sam, what's going on?"

She stepped back from the window looking about as pale as a sheet of paper and looked to Gabriel, who was standing in the doorway to the kitchen. "I thought..." she started, but then stopped, shook her head and looked out the window again, sweeping her eyes over the street.

"Sam, you're freaking me out a little. What's going on?" Gabriel asked her from the doorway. He wanted to move forward and to shake her a little bit, but her arms seemed to not be able to move.

She swallowed and tried to tell Gabriel again. "I thought I just saw Dean."


	15. Chapter 15

"Come again?" Gabriel asked her, shocked. It wasn't as though Gabriel was an easy person to shock, but Sam had managed it with surprising ease. Pretty much since he met her, she was always not doing what he expected of her.

"There was this guy that was walking along on the other side of the street from me and he had the same height and build that Dean would have had if he would have kept to my Dad's mantra of 'Be A Good Soldier'," Sam was rambling a little as her eyes swept up and down the street.

Gabriel remembered how to move his legs and walked up behind Sam. "I'm sure there are tons of guys that would have the same height and build as Dean. That doesn't mean that it's him," Gabriel remarked quietly.

"No, this guy had Dean's eyes. His hair, his swagger, the same bowed legs...I swear, Gabe, it was him."

"Even if it was, he's gone now. How do you plan on finding him?"

Sam finally tore her gaze away from the window and turned to look at Gabriel. "I have no idea. But Gabe...Dean is the only family that I have ever cared about. The only family that I have left...I can't just not chase after him."

Gabriel looked at her for a long moment and then nodded. "Alright," he told her with a sigh, "I was going to go to Bobby's anyway. You might as well come along and tell him about Dean. If he pops up anywhere, Bobby will know about it sooner or later."

Sam couldn't believe it. She might be able to see Dean again. She might be able to tell him that she loved him and that she was so sorry that she had to leave him. She would be able to ask him about what happened after she took off. It was enough to make her start to cry.

She wanted to tell Gabriel how much that meant to her. Maybe show him how incredible this was for her. She took a step and closed the gap between herself and Gabriel, caught his face in her hand and kissed him with all the emotions that were coursing through her. _Disbelieffearexcitementthankshopelove_ all poured from her lips and planted themselves firmly onto Gabriel's, and it took his breath away.

After a moment, Gabriel ended the kiss. It took everything he had to pull away softly and gaze into her eyes. "You need anything before we head out?" He asked her with warmth in his eyes.

Sam thought for a moment and then rummaged around in the boxes around her feet and found a granola bar. "Nope, let's go."

Sam's head was swimming the whole ride over to Bobby's house. It was far too short of a car ride, and she walked up the steps to his door with Gabriel in a daze. Dean could be here. Dean could be near here and he could be looking for her. It seemed incomprehensible to her, yet at the same time, it was so like Dean that she felt that she should have been looking for him this whole time.

She heard snapping in front of her face and she came back to herself in time to realize that Bobby and Gabriel were looking at her a bit worriedly. "Sorry," she whispered. It sounded too loud in her ears, but she continued on in a normal tone of voice, "I guess I got lost in my thoughts."

"Ya think?" Bobby asked her seriously, "You didn't hear us trying to get your attention the past five minutes?"

"...No," Sam replied and shrugged. "Sorry, I didn't mean to keep you waiting."

"Well, come on then, you need to tell me about Dean and what I should be on the lookout for," Bobby called over his shoulder as he made his way to his desk and sat behind it. The top of it was mounded with books and newspapers and odds and ends, almost to the point where someone wouldn't be able to tell if there was a desk underneath there at all. The legs and the panels that connected them was made of a dark cherry wood that was carved into intricate designs.

"What would you like to know?" Sam asked as she seated herself across from the desk.

"Well, the basics, like: name, height, build, any discerning characteristics. Then move on to things that would make him stand out: what's his personality, any interesting ticks, odd behaviors; something that would make him stand out to other people."

Sam nodded and started. "His full name is Dean Ross Winchester, though I doubt that he'll go by that name. More than likely he'll take the name of a 1970s rocker." Here, Bobby looked at Sam with a confused and interested look in his eyes. "He _loves_ classic rock. He's about six foot one, maybe two, and he's muscular. He lived his whole life to be a sort of person who can take on anything at any time. I know that he wanted tattoos, but I left before he was able to get them..." Sam huffed out a laugh, then kept talking. "He's cocky as hell, always letting his mouth get him in to trouble, but he's loyal and a good person to get stuck with in a jam. He _loves _pie. I think that it might be a sickness...He's really smooth; he could sweet talk a nun into fucking in a bathroom."

Gabriel and Bobby gaped at her and she smiled back at them. "I don't know that he's actually done that, but it wouldn't surprise me at all. He could always get whatever he wanted as a kid. I'm sure that carried over into adulthood."

There was a slight pause and then Bobby cleared his throat. "Anything else?"

Sam hesitated here and chewed her lip subconsciously as she thought. "I honestly don't remember a lot more than that. After he turned seventeen I really don't remember a lot about him."

"That's fine, Sam. I have more than enough here to get started," Bobby told her gruffly.

Sam and Gabriel stayed at Bobby's for supper that night and then drove home around eight o'clock. It was late enough that it was inconvenient to stay there any longer, but not late enough to want to sleep. They walked up the five flights of stairs quietly, both of them lost in their own thoughts.

Gabriel let them both in and Sam immediately went to the kitchen to get her box from the floor. She took it silently to their room and started to unpack it, and Gabriel left her alone to her belongings. She obviously didn't want any company, and Gabriel could respect boundaries.

He sighed as he went to work unpacking the boxes that were now 'tidily' stacked around the kitchen. He opened the top box of the stack that was supposed to head to the living room and found his record player. He smiled and placed it on the counter top and dug through the next few boxes until he found his vinyls. He placed them all in a stack next to the record player and set one of them up on the record player. Soon the music enveloped him and let his mind wander as he unpacked the kitchen and started putting it away in an order that made sense to him.

As he mindlessly worked, he thought about the conversation that he had with Bobby.

_"Have you heard anything about Lucifer?" Gabriel had asked him. It had been a few weeks since Gabriel had gotten Sam back from that lunatic, and he wanted to see if he and Sam still needed to be ready to leave at a moment's notice. _

_"Nah," Bobby had replied, which was interesting to Gabriel. "Everything is going smoothly still."_

_"This is weird, Bobby. Who took his place? Should we be worried about him?"_

_"Far as I can tell," Bobby answered "The guy who took over did so smoothly. There was no real fuss about it. If I were you, I would be wary, but I think that it would be okay if you settled wherever it is that you did. I think that if whoever it was that took over wanted blood, he would have taken it by now."_

"I had no idea that you listened to Michael Buble," Sam commented from the door of the kitchen. She had changed, he noticed, into a pair of baggy sweatpants that he thought were his and a flannel shirt. It was buttoned loosely and Gabe was pretty sure that there wasn't anything on underneath it.

"There's a lot you don't know about me, kiddo," Gabriel tossed over his shoulder.

"Oh really? Like what?" Sam asked.

Gabriel turned then, put down the griddle that he was holding and walked over to Sam with his hand outstretched, palm up. Sam eyed it quizzically and then placed her hand in his. He tugged her forward, caught her when she stumbled and whispered in her ear, "I know how to dance," as the first few bars of Georgia on my Mind came over the record player.

Sam blushed furiously and tried to stammer her way out of the dance. "I don't know how," she pleaded.

"Everyone has to learn sometime," Gabriel replied, and slowly started to sway to the beat of the music. As she started to loosen up, he casually started to turn in a circle as he started to hum a counter melody to the song. It wasn't long after that, that Gabriel was spinning her all around the kitchen floor, and Sam couldn't even be bothered to care. Her whole world had fallen away and it was just them, in this little tiny kitchen, just dancing to the music that surrounded them.

As the music ended, Sam pressed a kiss to Gabriel's mouth. Gabriel still held her close, but looked a little confused when she pulled away. "I wanted to thank you for taking me out to Bobby's," she told him as a blush rose high on her cheeks.

Gabriel cautiously leaned in to her space and kissed her softly, looking not to frighten her. She could feel all the held back passion in the kiss and she realized she wanted it. She wanted Gabriel to pour everything that he had into kisses and touches and bites and licks across her skin. She let him pull away and he replied, "I wanted to thank you for letting me dance with you."

They were still locked together in each other's arms when Sam leaned back into Gabriel's space. She did so cautiously, tying to understand how best to get Gabriel to relax and just...be with her. When she kissed him softly, he pulled away with a quizzical look on his face.

"And what was that one for?" Gabriel asked with amusement in his eyes.

"That one was for me," Sam replied and Gabriel's eyes got infinitesimally darker. That spurred Sam on, and she went in for another, this time more determined kiss. Gabriel froze momentarily and then returned the kiss hesitantly.

When they broke apart, Gabriel's gaze lingered on Sam's kissed lips and asked, "Are you sure you want this?"

"Yeah, I'm sure," Sam told him and tried to go in for another kiss, but Gabriel pulled his head away sharply.

"You have to tell me if I cross a line. Or if you don't like something. Or if you want to back out. Or-"

"Gabe," Sam interrupted and Gabriel stopped long enough to realize that he was babbling. "I'll be fine. I promise to let you know if something happens." And then she was kissing him again, and Gabriel really forgot everything else. The kiss made his blood boil and his skin get hot and feel as though it was stretched too tight. He wanted to sink into the kiss and drown in it. And just when he thought it couldn't get better, Sam's lips were parting and her tongue was tracing the seam of his lips.

He opened his mouth immediately and swallowed the sigh that Sam gave in appreciation. He felt her move closer to him so that her whole body was pressed against him. He felt fire race up and down wherever they touched and before he really knew what he was doing, he lifted the needle from the record player and started walking Sam backwards out of the kitchen.

It was a bit awkward; they didn't know exactly where the boxes were littered along the hallway, and there were a few times where they broke apart to chuckle at their own ineptness at getting from one room to another, but eventually made it to their bedroom. Sam felt her knees knock on the edge of the mattress and automatically sat down and laid back, dragging Gabriel on top of her. He tried to squirm off to the side, but she held him firm against her body and looked up into his eyes. "It's okay," she breathed, "I can handle it."

"I just-"

"Gabe," Sam looked pleading, which jolted Gabriel a little. "Please, just trust me."

And really, after everything that had happened between them, what reason did he have not to trust her? All she ever did was tell him the truth and be straight with him. She has never given any reason to doubt her, and yet here he was, thinking that she wouldn't say something if she was uncomfortable. That plea shifted everything into focus for Gabriel, and he realized that this was Sam beneath him. This was the woman that he found battered and bruised but still defiant and strong and he knew that if she wanted this, she would get it. "Okay," he whispered back and just let go.

He kissed her slowly but thoroughly, mapping out each bump and groove of her mouth. It was intense; each moment without a breath made Gabriel's head swim more and more with just being on top of Sam. The feel of her body against his, her chest to his, her heartbeat against his, her stomach flat where his had the tiniest hint of rounding. Their legs were intertwined, Sam's were spread enough to accommodate Gabriel's thigh and her foot was now tracing up his calf.

He slipped his mouth down past her lips and kissed her chin and down the column of her throat. Sam whimpered at that, and Gabriel was urged on, licking at each tendon and nibbling lightly at them. Sam started to roll her hips lightly underneath him and Gabriel drew a hand up to brush a thumb over her lips as he sat back on his knees and lifted the hem of her shirt. "Off," Gabriel half asked, half commanded and Sam blushed lightly as she complied.

He ran his hands up her sides lightly after she pulled the shirt over her head. He marveled at the scars that littered her skin and let his fingers run over them lightly. Sam looked as though she wanted him to stop, to not bring attention to her flaws, but she stopped herself and let him explore her skin. Her skin, Gabriel noticed, was smooth like silk and he couldn't stop touching it.

He jumped a fraction of an inch when he felt Sam's hands on his shirt, slipping it over his abdomen. He complied with her unspoken request and shed the button down to show his paler, more rounded skin. Sam looked almost awed by the feel of it under her fingers. Gabriel let her run her hands down his chest then down, around and back up to grip his shoulders as he leaned down over her and covered his mouth with hers and ran his hands through her hair. She shuddered and when he pulled away to make sure she was okay, he saw that her pupils were blown wide with lust. Gabriel dove down onto her neck again and tugged lightly in her hair and felt her shudder and moan quietly.

He wanted to draw out the teasing, he really did, but he couldn't take it anymore. He dislodged his hands from her hair and slowly licked and sucked and his way down to her pants. He glanced up at her and found that she had watched him slip down her body. When he found that she was propped up on her elbows looking at him, it took all of his self control not to rip them off of her body that second.

Instead, he slowly slipped the pants off of her legs. She helped him, rolling her hips and shimmying them down until she was practically naked and Gabriel was kneeling over her staring, almost as though he couldn't decide where to touch first. Sam smirked, lifted her legs and locked her feet behind Gabriel's back and brought her legs down, bringing him forward. He caught himself and Sam busied her hands with removing Gabriel's pants.

He was hard, so fucking hard, and Sam was driving him crazy. He let the pants slip easily down his legs and Sam looked up at him lazily as her fingertips toyed lightly with the waistband of his boxers. Her thumb occasionally brushing the aching length of his cock making him hiss in pleasure.

"Something bothering you, Gabe?" She asked coyly.

Gabriel smirked before replying, "You're a tease, Sam...Come on..."

"Everyone has a job," she sarcastically remarked and smirked as she continued, "But since you asked so nicely, I'll help you out." She slipped her thumbs under the elastic and slid them off his legs. She tapped on his side then and he scrambled to roll from on top of her and lay on his back. She situated herself between his legs then leaned up to kiss him as her hand came up to wrap around his dick. She became focused on her work as she tentatively stroked him from base to tip, gathered the precome that was gathering at his tip and slid her hand back down the shaft slowly.

Gabriel was losing his mind. The slow devil's magic that Sam was performing on his dick was equal parts wonderful and awful. Her grip was perfect and the way that she twisted her wrist on the downstroke was incredible and he had to think of floods and other catastrophes to not come right then and there. However, the fact that he wasn't in Sam was something that needed to be rectified.

"Sam...want to be inside of you..."

Sam looked up at him and smirked. "Ask and you shall receive."

Gabriel watched her and whimpered as she slid down his body and licked a stripe from his balls to his tip and then groaned as she sucked his whole cock into her mouth. He let himself fall back onto the pillows and felt Sam open her throat and take him deeper until her nose was nuzzling the hair at the base of his shaft. He slipped a hand into her hair again and rested his hand on her head and moaned as she slowly pulled off until just the head was in her mouth. Her tongue drew little patterns on him, and he nearly wanted to slam her head back down so he was enveloped in that wet heat again when she slid back down onto him, her tongue now tracing the vein on the underside of his dick. She swallowed around him and Gabriel had to pull her off before he came right there.

"Sam...Fuck, Sam, as wonderful as this is...I want to let this go on a little longer and your mouth might not let that happen."

She wiped her bottom lip and Gabriel whimpered a little bit and brought her up to kiss him. He could taste himself on her tongue and that made Gabriel moan into her mouth and kiss her harder. She responded and fought him for dominance in the kiss, which made it easier for Gabriel to roll on top of her. He braced himself with his elbow and slipped a hand between them and then between her legs.

She was wet, and Gabriel couldn't help but plunge his finger into that tight wet heat. Sam sighed from underneath him as he sank further and further into him.

"Fuck, Sam...God, you feel so good..." Gabriel was saying, and Sam arched into him at the words.

"Gabriel...please...Gabe want you inside me...please, please, Gabe..." Sam begged and Gabriel kissed her lightly before slipping his finger out of her.

"Ssh, Sammy, it's okay. I have you...I got ya, Sam," Gabriel murmured to her as he reached over to his bedside table to get a condom. Sam grabbed his arm and Gabriel looked at her curiously.

"I...I don't have anything...and I'm on the pill. Lu-...He got me tested every month and...I just want to feel you..." Sam was stammering out.

"Are you sure, Sam?" Gabriel asked her.

"Yes...please, Gabe," she answered as she tugged on his arm a little to get him to settle back over her. He complied and she sighed with contentment and closed her eyes as he settled over her. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders as he braced himself on one elbow and forearm. He shifted so that the head of his cock was pushing and straining at her entrance.

"Look at me, Sam," Gabriel told her and she opened her eyes to see Gabriel searching her face as he slowly slid into her. She was tight and wet and hot and it took everything he had not to thrust into her mindlessly and take and take until he came inside her. He rolled his hips and watched her face as he slid out sank back in. She sighed with each thrust and started rolling her hips to meet him with every thrust. "Christ, Sam, you feel so good..."

"Gabe, please...harder..." Sam moaned and Gabriel complied. He kept the pace, but thrust into her harder and Sam moaned underneath him. "Yes...Gabe...ngh, Fuck...Gabe, you feel so good..." Sam was babbling and it was making Gabriel crazy with want. He could feel his his orgasm start to build low in his belly and knew that it wouldn't be long. He snapped his hips harder and Sam started to keen beneath him. Gabriel lost his control then and started chanting Sam's name with every thrust and soon Sam was clutching at him and he felt her walls spasm around him. Her orgasm tipped him over the edge and after one, two thrusts, Gabriel was following her over the edge.

They stayed together like that for a long moment until Gabriel pulled out of her and flopped to his side of the bed completely exhausted. He reached out and wrapped his arms around Sam who willingly snuggled into his arms and laid her head down on his chest. He pulled the blankets up and over both of them as they laid in the quiet for a long time. "Are you okay, Sam?" Gabriel asked into the quiet.

"Yeah," Sam answered as she snuggled deeper into the comforter. "Just sleepy."

"Well then, I've done my job," Gabriel joked. "Go to sleep, Sam."

"Mmm, night," Sam whispered sleepily into his shoulder.

"Night, Sammy," Gabriel responded as he kissed the top of her head.


	16. Chapter 16

Sam woke up laying on her stomach with a heavy weight draped over her back, followed shortly by a quiet snore. She smiled and took a deep breath, stretching out all of her muscles systematically. She laid in the bed for a long moment, cataloguing every tender spot, until she felt Gabriel shift and slowly start to wake up. She wiggled closer to him and pressed a lazy kiss to his neck.

"Morning," she whispered into his ear with a grin.

"Mmm...morning," Gabriel answered with a sleepy smile.

"How'd you sleep?" Sam asked him between kisses, and Gabriel huffed out a laugh as he started to kiss whatever part of Sam was within reach.

"Like the dead," Gabriel responded. He grabbed her wrist and pulled her on top of him as he rolled onto his back. He threaded his fingers through her hair and continued kissing her, but before things could get to heated, Sam broke the kisses and pulled away from him. Gabriel wined a little at the loss.

"Coffee," Sam told him. "And teeth brushing, and all of that. I feel kinda gross," she added almost as an after thought.

"I can get behind coffee," Gabriel answered and they made their way from the bedroom to the kitchen. There were still plenty of boxes that needed unpacked, and Sam didn't work until the evening...

"So, I think that I'm going to help you unpack a little bit, now that you've started," Sam told him as she rooted around for the coffee filters and grounds.

"Sounds good to me," Gabriel responded as he came up behind Sam as she straightened and wrapped his arms around her. "You seem...oddly awake," Gabriel remarked.

Sam paused and thought about it for a moment before answering him. "I slept really well," she answered and turned in his arms to lay her head on his shoulder. "I didn't have a nightmare, and I didn't wake up uneasy."

Gabriel drew back a little and stared at Sam for a long moment. "You slept the whole night without a nightmare? Without even feeling uneasy?" Gabriel echoed trying to clarify what he had just heard.

Sam looked at him with a quizzical expression, "Yeah, that's what I said, right? I'm not speaking in tongues?" Sam answered with a chuckle.

"No, you're not, but it just seems...odd. You have had a nightmare every single night. It just seems like after a few months...shouldn't-" Gabriel stopped, trying to figure out the best way to try to say 'shouldn't you still be reeling and trying to deal' without making Sam out to be weak.

"Are you trying to say that I should still be dealing?" Sam said with a smirk.

"Well...kinda?" Gabriel answered with a small grin of his own.

Sam broke out of his embrace then, and started to prep the coffee maker. She pressed the brew button, turned and answered Gabriel. "I guess I should be...I've never really...Well, I guess I've never really dealt with all of it, especially not what happened with Lucifer. It was a thing, and it happened, and I'm still afraid to be alone in a room, and I need to know where people are constantly, but other than that I just shove it down and move on."

Instead of continuing with the conversation or chastising Sam, Gabriel nodded. "A bit of heavy conversation before either of us have had coffee," he remarked softly. Sam chuckled at that and agreed with him. Gabriel moved and gathered two mugs before walking over to Sam and handing her the bigger of the two. "If you want to talk, you can."

"I know," Sam whispered to him.

The coffee maker beeped, then, signaling that the coffee was done. Sam poured herself a mug and then poured Gabriel his. They sat in a mutual, comfortable silence for a while, just drinking coffee. It was almost as though there was an unwritten rule with them: there are no disturbances when coffee is being consumed. She smiled into her cup at the thought.

They worked together for a while, just listening to Gabriel's records and unpacking their boxes. It was nice, moving around each other and just learning each other's moves. Gabriel would hum counter melodies to the songs that drifted through the apartment while he worked, and Sam would dance slightly when she walked from room to room; Just a twirl every now and again, but Gabriel saw them all.

When the record finished and Gabriel was changing them out, Sam walked up to the doorway to the living room. She stood there for a minute, shifting her weight from foot to foot before she started talking. "I...I've been selling myself for a long time," Sam started and Gabriel whipped his head around to look at her with wide eyes. She was looking at her feet, but continued at the motion of Gabriel turning to look at her. "My father always loved Dean more than me; he would never put his little soldier into harm's way. But me...well, I was never really the kid he wanted, so what harm would there be in using me? Anyway, I always got paid for my, _services, _and the money went to helping Dean...Making sure that he had normal meals and shoes that fit, stuff like that. I honestly don't know if Dean really knew, at first, what was going on. After a while, his relationship with my dad got strained and he tried to make sure that I was okay when I got home from an especially long night." Sam looked up from her feet to Gabriel's eyes, which hadn't left her face. "It wasn't as though he did nothing. I think he tried to help, in his own way. It wasn't a lot, but it kept me going a lot of the time," Sam finished quietly.

Gabriel was still crouched over the record player, but upon the closing remarks of Sam's speech, he got up and walked to where Sam was leaning in the doorway. He gripped her arms and rubbed up and down them gently. "Thank you," Gabriel responded and Sam gave a confused head shake. "For trusting me enough to tell me. Maybe it wasn't trust, maybe it was comfort. Either way, thank you," Gabriel amended and then brought her in for a hug.

When he stepped back, Sam just nodded and went back to the kitchen. Gabriel stood there in the doorway fro a moment before shaking his head and getting back to his record player and then the boxes.

There was no more talk after that. They worked quietly for a few more hours and finally managed to get all of the boxes unpacked before Sam had to get to work. She changed quickly from her jeans and one of Gabriel's shirts to her work uniform. The uniform, in Gabriel's opinion was just a tough too skimpy; the top was essentially a corset and the pants were leather. Its not to say that she didn't wear it well, because she did. She wore it really well, and that was the problem.

"It's fine, Gabe. It's a bar, all the employees have to look skimpy. Especially the females."

"See, that's my problem. Are you sure that you're gonna be okay with what you're wearing with guys leering at you in a crowded and dimly lit bar?"

Sam gave him an indulgent smile. "As long as they aren't Luke, I'm sure that I'll be fine." Gabriel gave her a skeptical look, and she continued. "Right now, he's what I fear the most. All the other things tend to pale in comparison with being kidnapped and all that."

Gabriel shook his head and gave her a disapproving frown. "Don't do that," Gabriel asked her and she looked down at her feet.

"Sorry..." Sam told the floorboards and Gabriel just sighed.

"Its fine, just...don't do it again."

Sam nodded and then cleared her throat. "I should get going." she observed and Gabriel nodded then. "I'll see you when I get off," she told him and kissed him briefly before smiling at him shyly then slipping out the door.

Her first night at work was pretty easy. She got paired up with a girl named Jo who taught her what the drinks were and how to mix them. Everyone that she encountered was nice enough; a bit standoffish, but not outwardly hostile. She got some experience mixing drinks and taking orders, but more often than not, she was running to the back room and replenishing the bar: getting fruit to serve with drinks, making sure there was enough ice, even washing dishes. The work kept her busy and she wasn't complaining. Obviously she wasn't a pro yet, and she had yet to work a shift without a proverbial safety net, but she wasn't too worried about that. She was working, she wasn't in the way and therefore she was grateful.

It was sooner than she expected that her shift was over. There were still a few last minute things for her to do: wipe down the rest of the tables, take out the trash and the recycling from the night and a little bit of sweeping. She got the broom out of the closet in the back as Jo played REO Speedwagon on the jukebox in the corner. They worked together and listened to the music, which made the work seem to go faster. Soon the floors were swept, bottles were collected and all the tables were wiped down.

"You want me to take out the trash and stuff?" Jo asked her as she tied one of the bags together.

"Nah, I can take it. Thanks, though," Sam replied.

"Not a problem. See you in a few days," Jo told her and shrugged on her jacket as she left the bar.

"See ya," Sam called after her. Sam tied the trash bag and hauled it out of the bin. She carried each of the bags in one hand, bumping the door open with her hip. She turned and saw a man in the back parking lot near the dumpsters just standing there as though waiting for something. Or maybe someone. "Can I help you?" Sam called out to him. He turned then, almost as though he was startled, and Sam gasped. It was Dean. "Dean?" She whispered as she dropped the bags.

"Son of a bitch," Dean muttered and took off running.

"Dean!" Sam called out and ran after him. He was really hauling, and Sam was determined to keep him in her sight. "Dean, wait! I just want to talk to you!" But he didn't slow down. If anything, he seemed to run faster. "Fuck," Sam muttered and tried to stretch her legs just a little longer. Dean was running to quickly, though, he was getting away. "Dean, please!" She pleaded with him desperately as he rounded a corner. "Please," she demanded breathlessly as she rounded the same corner, but Dean was gone. "No...fuck, no please..." Sam pleaded with whoever was listening as she checked the alley. There was no Dean. He was gone. "God damn it!"

The walk back to the bar was long, but she got there eventually. She finished closing up and made sure that no one had come in and vandalized the place or stolen anything before she locked the doors and started the walk home. All she could think about was Dean. Why had he run? Why was he here? What was he doing? Who was he working for? Thoughts raced around her head as she slowly made her way to her building and walked up the five flights of stairs. She got to the apartment that she and Gabriel shared and turned the key in the door.

"Sam! Christ, I was worried. You were supposed to get off a half hour ago? What the hell?" Gabriel was saying from the other end of the hallway.

"I saw Dean," Sam told him and Gabriel froze. "I was closing up and he was in the back and I saw him and he ran. I called after him, but he just kept running. I lost him when I thought he ducked into an alley. He wasn't there," Sam finished.

"Sam..."

Gabriel started, but Sam interrupted him. "I'm really not in the mood, Gabe. I just want to go to bed."

"...Alright," Gabriel told her, and she sighed as she pushed her way to the bathroom to take a quick shower and get ready for bed. When she did finally snuggle under the covers, Gabriel whispered to her, "You can't keep running, Sam."

"That's all I know how to do," she replied.


	17. Chapter 17

Bobby Singer was making chili two weeks after he had originally called Ellen to find and tail Dean Winchester when he got the phone call.

"What?" was the distracted greeting that was almost yelled down the line of the phone.

"I found him," the woman on the other end of the line answered.

"Where is he? What's he doin'?" Bobby asked her, knowing exactly who it was on the other end of the line at this point.

"He's staying at a motel outside of town. He seems to be in intelligence work or something. He comes and goes and never in the same 'uniform' twice."

"What do you mean, uniform?"

"What does it sound like, Bobby? He has a suit, but he also has probably 15 fake IDs. And from what I hear from Jo down at the bar, he's run up quite the tab under different names. But Bobby, we have a problem."

"What? Why?"

"Bobby...He's working for Crowley."

"Balls."

Gabriel was on a job when he got the call from Bobby. He was delivering the news to a couple of abusive parents; telling them that no, they were not going to get custody of their children back. It was a good feeling, knowing that these kids were going to get out of such a toxic environment and hopefully into a place where they could grow up to be normal. They were young, he was almost certain that if they stayed together that they would be fine. His phone rang just as he was stepping out of the Children's Advocacy Center.

"Hey, Bobby, what's up?"

"Ellen found him," Bobby's tone was defeated, and Gabriel couldn't help but freeze next to the door.

"That's a good thing, though, right? Why do you sound like someone killed Rumsfeld?"

There was a short pause and then Bobby forced the rest of the news out. "He's working for Crowley."

Gabriel couldn't speak. All of the air had been punched out of him.

"At least, that's what Ellen has come up with so far. She's not 100% sure where he is in the organization, but were looking into it."

"What...What should I tell Sam? She'll be devastated if she finds out that Dean's working for Crowley..."

"Honestly? I wouldn't tell her anything, yet. We need more information before we go and tell her that her only remaining family is in league with the guy who took over for the man who kidnapped and abused her."

"She has to be told, Bobby..."

"And she will be. Just, not quite yet. We need to know how bad this is before we give her a partial picture."

Gabriel thought about that and realized that that was probably a good idea. There were things that needed to be talked about, things that needed to be ascertained before Sam was told that her brother was in this kind of trouble. "Okay...you're right."

"I'll let you know when something new comes in."

"Alright, Bobby. Thanks for the information."

"Anytime, son." There was a click and the line went dead.

Gabriel stood, staring at the phone that was cradled in his hand. Sam was going to be devastated. She was so convinced that Dean was going to stay out of that kind of trouble; because Lucifer Novak, now Crowley, was trouble.

Pretty much any vice that you could think of, Lucifer had had a hand in it; from drugs to gambling to sex trade, Lucifer had built himself a little empire out of it all. Now that Crowley was running the show, Gabriel was sure that there were going to he some policy change if not some elbow grease to make new clients fall in line and old clients to show him some respect. Gabriel could only imagine what Dean was doing with Crowley, and none of it was good.

Gabriel slowly walked home, knowing that Sam was going to be just getting ready for a shift at the bar when he got back. Thankfully Sam was running a little late and didn't notice that Gabriel was completely out of sorts before she ran out the door. Gabriel walked to the kitchen and poured himself a nice, healthy dose of whiskey and sat down on the recliner to think about all that Bobby had told him.

Maybe Ellen was wrong. Though that possibility was pretty slim; there was a reason that Ellen worked for Bobby and that was that she was damn good at what she did. If Ellen found evidence of Dean working for Crowley then it was probably legit. Though, if Dean was spared from all of that growing up, then how did he get into the seedier part of life now? Was he paying back a debt? Did Sam's father introduce Dean to it after Sam left? Really, Sam had no idea what happened after she had split, so there was a very real chance that Dean was indoctrinated by Daddy dearest right after Sam decided that she had had enough. There were too many variables and not enough facts, and with that thought he realized that Bobby was right. There was no way that Gabriel could have told Sam anything without more information. He would just have to wait and see what Ellen turned up.

And while he was waiting, there was no reason to not have another drink.

He must have lost track of time because it seemed that the next thing he knew, he was being pulled out of his musings by the sound of the front door being unlocked.

"Sammy, baby! How was work, Doll Face?" Gabriel slurred lightly and Sam was really done with having to deal with drunk people tonight. The patrons tonight were especially rowdy due to the fact that it was a fight night; the bar was crowded and too drunk to really be allowed out in public. She was really looking forward to just coming home and laying down, but it seemed as thought that wasn't in the cards for tonight.

"It was loud and chaotic. How much have you had?" Sam asked as she put her coat down and threw her keys in the dish that was by the door of the apartment.

"Um...about a quarter of a fifth," Gabriel said as he went to get up to refill his glass. Sam beat him to it though, and lifted the bottle and turned toward him. He froze at the door to the kitchen and looked a little sheepish. "Okay, so maybe half a fifth?"

"Yeah, I think you're done. I'm surprised that you can still stand and make sense."

"I am pretty magical," Gabriel answered her as he reached for the bottle that was in Sam's hand.

"Gabe, come on. You've really had enough."

"Give me the bottle, Sam," Gabriel whined at her as she held it above her head. Gabriel wasn't sure how to gain that much height yet, so he just pondered the bottle in the air for a moment.

"No, Gabe, just give it a rest."

"Listen, Sammy, I can take care of myself. I know when to stop myself, and sweetheart, I still have a drink or two to go," Gabriel told her as he reached up to grab the bottle. His body was pressed against hers and as his fingers almost grasped the bottle as it slipped out of Sam's hand at the nicknames. The bottle fell to the floor and Sam's face drained of color as she heard the names.

She wasn't in their apartment anymore. She was sitting in a motel with Dean after she had come back from a long night with a scum bag that thought that leaving bruises and pulling chunks of hair out was sexy.

_"You don't need to do this, Sam." Dean whispered to her from his side of the bed. There were two feet between the two of them, so he knew that Sam had heard him. _

_"I do. Do you remember the last time that I tried to tell Dad no? I couldn't see anyone for two weeks because I had to let the bruises fade from my face."_

_"No, you don't. This isn't right. Let me talk to Dad and see if there's a way to stop this."_

_"No, Dean, you can't. He's not going to let me stop, and I know that if I can bring in some extra money then you can have new boots when you need them."_

_"Sammy, I can take care of myself!"_

And then the scene and the memory melted and moved to that room in the basement of Luke's house.

_Lucifer was leaning over her with nothing but rage and cold distance in his ice blue eyes. _

_"You've been a naughty girl, Sam," Luke whispered into her ear. Sam whimpered and tried to shy away. "Ah ah, no going away. You were a naughty girl and you need to be punished. Now, the question is, what should your punishment be tonight?"_

_"Please, Luke, I'm sorry. I didn't-"_

_"The time for apologies is over, Sweetheart. It's time now to show you who you can look at and who you belong to."_

"Sam! SAM!" Gabriel was shaking her lightly and she snapped out of the memories. Her eyes darted around the room and finally landed on Gabriel. The look on his face said that he knew what he had done and that there was no way that he could ever tell Sam how sorry he was for it. "Are you alright?" He asked her when she had made eye contact with him.

Sam just leaned back against the counter and let her body sink to the floor. She was shaky and felt like she needed to throw up and go take a shower. She had broken out into a cold sweat and she was hyperventilating, but she couldn't seem to stop it. She kept checking the room for Lucifer before she remembered that he was dead and that he wasn't coming after her.

"Sam, I need you to slow your breathing," Gabriel was telling her, and she wanted desperately to please him, to just take a deep breath. But the more that she wanted to, the more she found that she could only take shallow breaths. She watched Gabriel get up and get a brown paper bag. It was small, a lunch bag, and Gabriel handed it to her. "I want you to fill this bag with air."

Sam looked at him and then the bag. She took it from him and worked at each breath until she was filling the bag with each breath. Once she had gotten her breathing under control, her heart rate quickly resumed a normal pace and Sam felt as though she could function again. She looked at Gabriel again and he asked her, "Are you good, now?"

Sam nodded in response and swallowed, trying to work some saliva into her mouth. "Thank you...for helping with the breathing."

"Why are you thanking me? You should be yelling and screaming at me for inducing that!" Gabriel told her exasperatedly.

Sam shook her head. "I don't want to fight with you tonight. I just want to take a shower and go to bed."

"Yeah, sure thing, Sam," Gabriel told her as they both got to their feet.

"I...I'm gonna crash in the living room," Sam said quietly, and the words nearly put Gabriel on the ground again.

"W-What?" Gabriel asked her as she turned to look at him.

"I...I'm going to crash in the living room. I just want to be alone tonight," Sam repeated and Gabriel blanched.

"No...Sam, I didn't mean it, I'm sorry...Sam…" Gabriel was rambling trying to find the right thing to say.

"Gabe," Sam interrupted him and Gabriel quickly shut his mouth. "I don't want to fight with you about this tonight. I'm going to take a shower and then I'm going to sleep."

Gabriel stood in the kitchen as Sam walked away from him. She went into their room, grabbed clothes and then walked into the shower silently. Gabriel heard the water start and Sam locked the door behind her.

It took a long couple of minutes to actually get his feet to work. Once he did, though, he walked to the mess of alcohol and glass on the floor and started to pick up the bigger pieces of glass. Then he wiped up the alcohol with a dishtowel and made sure that there wasn't any glass on the floor before retreating to their room. He moved to the chest that was at the foot of the bed and gathered some extra blankets and threw them down on the floor in the living room. He messily unfolded them and got as comfortable as he could on the hard floor and stuffed a pillow under his head as he waited for Sam to get out of the shower.

Sam started the water and locked the door behind her. She slid down the door to sit at the base of it. The cool tiles felt good against her feet as she gathered herself. The memories that had hit her were strong; she felt as though her whole body was remembering what had happened, and the physical pain in both memories was intense.

She slowly undressed and walked under the spray of the shower. She grabbed a loofa and scrubbed her body until her skin was pink and new and she felt as though she had gotten some of the scum that was really nonexistent off of her skin. After that, she had sat on the floor of the shower and just let the too hot water slide down her skin. It felt good; it cut through all the other thoughts that were in her head and suppressing them. She focused on the heat and the pain of the water and each individual droplet as it dropped onto her skin.

By the time that she got out of the shower, the whole bathroom was filled with steam, and there wasn't any hot water left coming out of the shower head. She stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around her body. On a whim, she wiped the mirror of the bathroom down with her hand and studied her reflection briefly before she looked away, disgusted with the image before her.

She quickly put the pajamas that she had gathered previously on and walked out the door. The steam billowed out of the room as she walked to the living room. She found Gabriel laying on the floor in a nest of blankets, and she stopped by the door leaning on the frame for a long few moments before turning and walking to the bed and collapsing into it, hoping for a nice, dreamless sleep.


	18. Chapter 18

Her night, sadly, was not dreamless. It was plagued by nightmares of all the...things that her father sold her to; all the things that she did that made her feel dirty and almost subhuman culminating in her kidnapping at the hands of Lucifer. When she did wake up, it was in a cold sweat, shouting and trying to vault out of bed at five in the morning.

She propulsion was stopped by Gabriel, who was sitting on her side of the bed. Before she could make sense of who it was and why they were there, her arm flew up and she landed a solid right hook in his cheek. She leapt from the bed and ran to the front of the apartment looking for a weapon. When she saw Gabriel emerge from their room, she had her keys in her hand with the most serrated one threaded between her second and third fingers and her back was pressed against the door.

"Sam," he said in a quiet tone from the door of the bedroom, "Sam I need you to focus on me." There was only heavy breathing from Sam. "Sam, it's just me. It's just Gabriel," He tried as he took a step toward her.

"Stay the hell away from me," Sam warned him from the door, brandishing the keys at him.

"Sam, I need you to calm down -"

"Calm down? I got back from a stressful night of work surrounded by drunk people to find you just as drunk in the living room. Which is fine, because you're welcome to have a drink. But when you leaned up against me and you...you called me...you know that he called me that. You know that when he...when he was about to...rape me, right in front of you he called me that. Every time he saw fit to 'punish' me he called me that fucking name. And with you all pressed up against me so that you didn't lose your balance and breathing whiskey all over my face…"

"I'm sorry about that, Sam…" Gabriel started, but Sam interrupted him.

"No, I really don't know that you are. Because you have no idea what that's like. You have no idea what my dreams are like because of that. So what made you want to get so drunk that you would forget about Lucifer and all of that?"

"I can't…"

"Bullshit, you 'can't'. You just don't want to," Sam spat at him and Gabriel slumped as though in defeat.

"No, Sam, I really can't. I don't know what I can say yet."

"Why don't you just give me your pathetic reasoning and then we can move on from there?"

"It's not pathetic -" Gabriel tried.

"Then tell me what it is!" Sam yelled at him from across the room.

"Bobby called me today and said that he found Dean," Gabriel yelled back.

Sam looked about ready to spew some witty retort, but she paused and her face wrinkled in confusion. "What?"

Gabriel swallowed and forced out the next words. "He said that Dean is probably working for Crowley. But he wanted to make sure before I told you." Sam gaped at him. Gabriel continued on and started to walk very slowly towards Sam. "So instead of being my usual obnoxious self, I had a drink, because I didn't know how to tell you that your brother, the one that you have been chasing after for so long, might be mixed up with Crowley, despite your best intentions."

Gabriel was halfway up the hallway now, and he watched as the wheels in Sam's head were turning.

"No...It's not possible," Sam whispered.

"I don't know what's possible right now, that's why I didn't want to tell you anything," Gabriel calmly told her again. He was up to the kitchen doorway now, so he paused to look at Sam. She was terrified and disbelieving and small and scared in that moment. His heart broke to think that the information was probably true; that Sam's last ray of hope was dimming right before her eyes.

"Bobby's wrong," Sam said more resolutely into the room as Gabriel inched closer to the girl against the door. "He's wrong and until Dean tells me to my face, I refuse to see things that way. Dean's just doing some recon; he's just working a case. There's no way that he could-"

"Sam," Gabriel stopped her mid rant and her eyes met his. She dropped the keys and slumped to the ground.

"I'm so sorry, Gabriel. I just…" Sam started, trying to find the right words to make him understand what made her punch him, yell at him, exile him; while making sure that he was the only person that she let close to herself, because if anyone, Gabriel would be the one to understand her. Or at least, wait to try to understand her.

"Shh...It's okay, Sam. It's okay," He reassured her as he gathered her body into his arms. He rocked her for a long time, sitting on the floor and just letting Sam cry until she couldn't produce tears anymore. "Come on," He whispered into her hair. "Let me carry you to bed. You can try to sleep more."

Sam was really too tired to really contemplate what that sentence meant, but also too tired to argue. She let him gather her infinitely closer to his body and soon she was being lifted from the hardwood. The heat that was radiating off of his body was oddly reassuring, as was the smell of his clothes. They had almost lulled her into sleep again when Gabriel gently place her on the bed and drew the covers over her body.

"Wait…" Sam whispered weakly. Gabriel turned and looked at Sam, crouching down next to the bed. Sam snuggled down into the covers and wriggled down to be at the same level with Gabriel. "Can you...Can you do me a favor?"

"Anything, Sam," came the instantaneous reply. It made smile a little before she went on with her request.

"Could you just...talk to me. Just before I fall asleep?"

This time it was Gabriel's turn to give a small, soft smile. "Of course, Sam. Let me start at the beginning."

Dean was walking back to his crappy motel room after some truly dismal negotiations. He couldn't stay in this town, not when Sam was here. There was too much at stake. There was no way that he was letting Sam know what he was doing, let alone who he was doing it with. Crowley was the low of the low. Originally a pretty notorious drug dealer, Crowley was now trying to wrangle all of the empire that his boss, Lucifer, had left behind.

And that was the whole reason that he had gotten tangled up in this anyway, wasn't it? Between Dad being dead set on following his deadbeat dealer from town to town because he was too paranoid to buy from anyone else and trying to find Sammy, Dean had found himself in what was supposed to be reconnaissance that turned into indentured servitude. Crowley had been quick and cunning and had lead Dean directly into a bargain that he had never really meant to strike. Ten years of working for Crowley and then the smarmy scottish bastard would clear his father's staggering drug debt and would reveal where Sam was.

At the time, it seemed as though it would be easy. Ten years of being bathed in the filthy underbelly of society making sure that he stayed just on the right side of the proverbial fence and then he could find Sam and clear his father's debt. Dean had thought that it was a pretty decent cut, at the time. But after stewing in...people that were straight out of his own nightmares day in and day out, the lines of his morals became a little blurry. It wasn't very much longer after that, that Dean had found himself thinking about how easy it would be. Dealing drugs, guns, women; there would be no regulation. He had the opportunity to make a lot of money, and he could use the money. He would save it for Sam so that she could go to school. She always loved to learn, and after all that she went through when they were kids, there was finally something that he could do. That last thought: Giving something back to Sam as a repayment for everything that she went through, was how he got so tangled up in the mess that he was in now.

He was one of Crowley's men, but that wasn't even the worst of it. Crowley wouldn't let him deal in anything that he had already sort of comfortable dealing. Instead, Crowley had made him a hit man; someone who was sold to the highest bidder. Dean had tried to get out of it, to do anything but the jobs that Crowley had given him. Eventually though, Dean had learned that there was no going against the demon that he was working for when he met Alistair.

Dean shivered at the thought as he walked through the door to the motel room and sighed as he sat on the edge of the bed. He rested there a moment before he rose and toed off his boots. He walked in his socks to the "kitchen area" where he had left the bourbon, pouring himself a healthy dollop. The liquid burned down his throat and tasted like gasoline, but it was distracting, and that was really all that he wanted right now. He wanted to forget everything. Every mark, every monster that he had mercilessly 'put down", every time his mind inched closer to the thought that maybe he could get used to killing people, every time that he insanely thought that the planning of the death would be fun…

"What the fuck am I?" he asked the reflection in the mirror across the room hanging on the back of the door. Before the long list of names in his head could be completed, he threw his glass at the door. It exploded upon impact and Dean whirled to punch hole after hole into the cabinetry behind him. He panted and pressed his bloody fist into the counter as one thought refused to leave him alone:

What would Sammy think of what he had become?


End file.
